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A QUARTER CENTURY 

OF 

PUBLIC SCHOOL 
EVELOPMENT 



BY 

WILLIAM H. MAXWELL 

SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK 
WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY 

NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER 



COLLECTED BY THE COMMITTEE ON THE CELEBRATION OF THE 
TWENTY-FIFTH ANNIVERSARY OF DR. MAXWELL'S SUPERINTENDENCY 



NEW YORK • : • CINCINNATI • : • CHICAGO 

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY 



<? 

"*.% 



v*.* 



Copyright, 1912, bv 
WILLIAM H. MAXWELL. 



QUAR. CENT. PUB. SCHOOL DEV. 

W. P. I 



A**/- 



PREFACE 

It seemed to be fitting that, upon the completion 
of a quarter of a century of service by Dr. William 
H. Maxwell as City Superintendent of the schools 
of Brooklyn and New York, a collection of his edu- 
cational writings should be made. Dr. Maxwell was 
therefore persuaded to allow others to attempt a 
piece of work that his busy days gave him *no oppor- 
tunity to perform and the preparation of this volume 
has, by his permission, been undertaken by a com- 
mittee of editors who are responsible for the selec- 
tion of the papers which are included in the book. 

Those who read its pages cannot fail to be im- 
pressed, as were the editors, by the fact that many 
of what we now count the most ordinary and neces- 
sary activities of the public school had to be fought 
for year by year, and sometimes for many years, 
before they were accepted and made part of our 
educational system. 

THE EDITORS 



INTRODUCTION 

The public career of Dr. Maxwell in the cities 
of Brooklyn and of New York is at once an ex- 
ample and an inspiration. It is an example to 
those public officers who are without conviction or 
guiding principle, and whose ears are ever bent 
to catch the sound of every passing w r ave of shal- 
low opinion. It is an inspiration to those who 
are sometimes prone to despair of the conditions 
attending public service in our American de- 
mocracy. 

Dr. Maxwell affords perhaps the most striking 
example that our generation has seen of a man of 
scholarship, courage, and firm principle in high 
public office. He has had more to do than any 
other man, or any other hundred men, with shaping 
the public educational system of New York so that 
it will be free from political domination ; free from 
the taint of personal influence or privilege, and 
free from narrow and pedantic formalism. It 
would be difficult to exaggerate the importance of 
Dr. Maxwell's life work. The citation of elaborate 



Vll 



viii INTRODUCTION 

statistics might illustrate but would not reveal it in 
anything like its importance and its wide scope. 
The worst and most self-seeking elements in the 
metropolis have persistently opposed Dr. Maxwell 
and his policies, and have sought, by ways that were 
dark and tricks that were vain, to humiliate and to 
defeat him. While this opposition has from time 
to time harassed Dr. Maxwell, it has never caused 
him to lose his courage, to weaken his grip upon 
his principles, or to enter upon the cheap and easy 
path of compromise. He has gained the fullest 
measure of support from the press and the best 
elements of the city's population that any public 
officer in New York has ever had. Men and 
women who care for the city's good, and who know 
what is involved in offering the right or the wrong 
opportunity for training, to the city's children, have 
looked on with admiration and joy as Dr. Maxwell 
has fought one successful battle after another for 
the freedom of the schools, for the enforcement 
of the highest practicable standards of fitness in 
teaching, and for making the needs and interests 
of the children the sole aim of public school policy. 
In these days of political stress and storm, when 
public opinion is blown about like a leaf upon the 
wind, it is noteworthy that in the city of New York 
a man of Dr. Maxwell's eminence as scholar, as ad- 
ministrator, and as citizen has been permitted to 



INTRODUCTION IX 

spend the long years of an active life in the devoted 
service of the city and of the city's children. 

The publication of this volume is a well-earned 
tribute to Dr. Maxwell's public service. It reveals 
only in small part what that service has been, for 
men are so minded that it is only when the bark of 
life has put out forever upon the shoreless sea that 
they are willing to tell all that is in their hearts of 
their friend. Therefore, the printed records and his 
published writings are left to speak for themselves. 

Of one thing we may be sure : when Dr. Max- 
well's task is closed and the time comes for him to 
lay down the heavy burden that he has so sturdily 
and so worthily borne, the city of New York will 
say with one voice, "Well done, thou good and 
faithful servant." 

NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER 

Columbia University, 
September 18, 191 2 



CONTENTS 



Com 



I. Expectations and Ideals 

II. Literature in the Grades 

III. The Duties of Principals 

IV. The Kindergarten 

V. Manual Training in the Grades . 

VI. The Controversy of 1904 

VII. Manual Training High Schools . 

VIII. Commercial Education .... 

IX. Why Students leave High School before 

PLETING THE COURSE .... 

X. Qualifications of High School Teachers 

'XI. Trade Schools . ... 

XII. Promotion and Retardation of Pupils 

XIII. Physical Training 

XIV. Hygienic Conditions of School Buildings 
XV. Medical Officers 

XVI. The Health of School Children . 

XVII. A Department of School Hygiene 

XVIII. Schools for Defective Children . 

XIX. Truant Schools ..... 

XX. Summer Schools and Playgrounds 

XXI. Continuation vs. Evening School . 

XXII. School Libraries ..... 

XXIII. Departmental Teaching in Elementary Schools 



PAGE 

1 
11 
16 

25 
42 

53 
66 

77 



98 
108 
124 
170 
180 
183 
185 
189 
203 
214 
217 
223 
226 
229 



Xli CONTENTS 

XXIV. Teachers 1 Salaries 238 

XXV. The Board of Examiners 258 

XXVI. "Merging" of Eligible Lists .... 263 

XXVII. The Growth of the New York City Schools 

from 1900-1910 . 267 

XXVIII. City School Systems 277 

XXIX. Charter Provisions as related to the Organi- 
zation of School Systems . . . 304 

XXX. Present Problems of the School . . -321 

XXXI. The American Teacher — a Code of Ethics . 346 

XXXII. Education for Efficiency 367 

XXXIII. The Economical Use of School Buildings . 383 

XXXIV. The Personal Power of the Teacher in Pub- 

lic School Work 396 



A QUARTER CENTURY OF PUBLIC 
SCHOOL DEVELOPMENT 



EXPECTATIONS AND IDEALS 

In his report for 1896 Dr. Maxwell summed up what had been accom- 
plished in the Brooklyn schools during the preceding ten years and indicated 
most of the measures which under his leadership have since been adopted for 
the improvement of the schools of Greater New York. — The Editors. 

(From the Brooklyn Report for i8g6) 
VACATION SCHOOLS 

A BEGINNING will probably be made during the cur- 
rent year, by private effort, to open at least one 
vacation school. The object is to give kindergarten and 
manual training instruction to children whose circumstances 
compel them to spend their summers in the streets. Some 
years ago, I recommended that this work should be under- 
taken by the Board of Education, but the suggestion at 
that time met with no response. My hope is that the ex- 
periment about to be tried will so demonstrate the utility 
of vacation schools that the work will be undertaken on 
an extensive scale by the Board of Education. If the 
schools in the poorer neighborhoods were open from 8 to 
11 a.m. during the months of July and August, the op- 
portunity to obtain suitable intellectual and manual train- 
ing thus presented to thousands of children, who perforce 
spend the long vacation without work and without rational 
amusement, would be of incalculable value. 



2 EXPECTATIONS AND IDEALS 

SCHOOLS AS NEIGHBORHOOD CENTERS 

The idea is gaining ground that there are legitimate 
uses, in addition to the regular school work, to which the 
school buildings may be put. For instance, should we 
ever have a free public library in our city, it would seem 
specially appropriate to establish branch libraries and read- 
ing rooms in central public schools. Then again, there is 
no good reason why these buildings should not be utilized 
in the evenings by debating societies and other organiza- 
tions for self-improvement. The difficulties in the way 
are insignificant in comparison with the good that would 
result, and they would easily yield to a slight exercise of 
executive ability. The public school best serves its neigh- 
borhood when it is made the center from which all organ- 
ized civilizing and elevating influences, except, of course, 
those that are the peculiar province of the church, shall 
radiate. 

parents' societies 

Nothing has been more remarkable in the history of the 
Brooklyn schools than the apathy with which the schools 
have been regarded by the great body of the people. 
There are signs, however, that different views are likely to 
prevail in the future. One of the most wholesome indi- 
cations of the time is the formation of two societies — one 
in the district of No. I, the other in the district of No. 
35 — organized to aid and encourage the work of pub- 
lic education in their respective neighborhoods. Such 
societies, if they are guided by wisdom, may do much 
to improve the condition of the public schools, and 
especially to establish those close relations between parent 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1896 3 

and teacher that are essential to the proper training of 
the child. Such societies may lead careless parents to see 
how deep a concern they have in the education of their 
children. They will bring home to the minds of many 
who do not now see it the usefulness of art education, of 
manual training, and of physical culture. They will take 
care that the school grounds are planted with flowers, 
and shrubs, and trees ; that school playgrounds are 
extended ; and that the schoolrooms are adorned with 
suitable pictures. They will secure for the schools col- 
lections of plants,. shells, minerals, books, magazines, and 
photographs. They will show their appreciation of good 
work in the schools ; and, when there is criticism to 
be made, they will make it in so kindly a w r ay as to 
disarm pugnacity. Above all, they will lead the k teacher 
to see that the school is doing its best work when it is 
cordially cooperating with other forces for good in the 
community. 

" The mission of the public school," says Superintendent 
Dutton, " is closely related to all forms of social work. 
The methods found most successful in dealing with the de- 
fective, the vicious, and the neglected classes are such as 
have been tried advantageously in the school. On the 
other hand, the methods, aims, and humanitarian spirit of 
the social reformer are essential to the life of every good 
school. . . . Teachers must become conscious of the 
commanding importance of the school as a social factor 
influencing every form of humane endeavor, reflecting its 
spirit and aims in the life and conduct of the people, and, 
in turn, ,dra wing inspiration and help from every depart- 
ment of the world's activity." 



EXPECTATIONS AND IDEALS 



EXPECTATIONS AND IDEALS 



Indeed, it is only through such a union of all the forces 
of society that the best results may be obtained from pub- 
lic school work, or even that moderate expectations may be 
realized. While much of the criticism of the public 
schools that appears in the newspapers is captious and 
irrational, while many are disappointed in the schools 
because they expect too much, yet it is still pertinent to 
inquire what may reasonably be expected from the schools. 

In the first place, it may be reasonably expected that 
every public school shall keep constantly in view the 
three great departments of education : physical, intellec- 
tual, and moral. 

It is only very recently that the elementary schools of 
Brooklyn have given systematic attention to physical edu- 
cation. Free gymnastic exercises are now given in all 
classes. This is a great step forward, but it is not all 
that may be reasonably expected. The public schools 
ought to provide gymnasia with simple apparatus, large 
playgrounds, and instructors in organized play. They 
ought to provide further for the serving of wholesome 
mid-day lunches in all schoolhouses, to be paid for when 
the parents are able, and to be given gratis when the 
parents are not able. The example of Paris shows us 
that this is perfectly feasible, and that it may be managed 
without causing the poor child to feel ashamed of his pov- 
erty. There is one thing worse than a hungry stomach, 
and that is the loss of self-respect. Better to have no 
lunch system than to cause children to lose their self- 
respect. But Paris has shown us how this may be done. 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1896 5 

Again, it may be reasonably expected that all the in- 
tellectual work of the school shall be so managed as not 
to interfere with the physical well-being of the child. 
Schoolrooms should be well lighted, heated, and venti- 
lated. It is a disgrace to our civilization that the training 
of children should be conducted in rooms where the air 
is grossly impure, and where the eyes are sure to be 
injured. The very statement of the fact that there are 
such rooms in the schools of Brooklyn should be enough 
to condemn them. It is surely not unreasonable to ask 
that immediate steps be taken to place all such rooms in 
proper sanitary condition, or to replace them with others. 
I submit that the expenditure of money for this purpose 
is of vastly greater importance than building boulevards 
or laying out parks, and will not cost nearly so much. 
What will a man take in exchange for his health, or even 
for his sight ? Surely not boulevards or parks. Boule- 
vards and parks we want and will have, but we need first 
that our schoolhouses shall not deprive us of the ability 
to enjoy them. 

And yet again, it may be reasonably expected that the 
teacher will so manage the intellectual work that it shall 
not only not injure, but shall actually promote the physical 
well-being of the child. This will not be the case where 
the school work is a dull, mechanical routine, and where 
the child is burdened with a load of matter to be memo- 
rized at home — long lists of names without meaning, words 
without connection, and definitions that are empty shells. 
Work of this kind simply oppresses the legitimate activi- 
ties of mind and body, and forces them into illegitimate 
channels. 



6 EXPECTATIONS AND IDEALS 

In recent years there has been much discussion with 
regard to the school curriculum, but though new things 
may be occasionally introduced, it is safe to say that the 
elementary school course will remain substantially as it 
is at present. The reason is that our modern civilization 
demands that all or nearly all the things that are taught 
shall continue to be taught. As the matter stands at 
present, the elementary school pupil is supposed to ac- 
quire, in addition to reading, writing, and arithmetic, the 
power of using the English language as a vehicle of 
thought, to learn something of grammar, geography, and 
the history of his own country, and to gain some knowledge 
of the great facts and laws of nature. 

It is hardly worth while to discuss this curriculum, be- 
cause it is now almost universally accepted. What it con- 
cerns us to know is the use that is made of these subjects. 

Where there is purely mechanical teaching — only 
memory work — or even where mechanical teaching and 
pure memory work largely predominate, the subjects of 
the school curriculum are not properly utilized. 

It may, I think, be reasonably expected that these studies 
shall be so taught, so utilized, as to produce certain results. 

First, it may be reasonably expected that the teaching 
of these things shall be so correlated that one study shall 
reenforce every other study ; that the teaching shall lead 
to that animation of mind which results in mental prompt- 
ness to connect one thing with another, to illustrate one 
thing by another. 

Second, it may be reasonably expected that the treat- 
ment of these subjects shall be such as shall give to the 
child the power of doing a thing right, whether that thing 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1896 7 

be great or small. The new education, so called, in its 
revolt against the memoriter-mechanical methods of the 
schools has too often resulted in careless, slovenly work on 
the part of children. Yet it is not impossible to combine 
accuracy with reasonable freedom, painstaking care with 
spontaneity. However much mechanical methods may be 
decried, we should always remember that if a child is to 
write at all, it is better he should write a clear, neat, legible 
-hand ; if he is to add a column of figures, that he should 
add them correctly ; that whatever is worth doing at all in 
school is worth doing right. In a word, it may be reason- 
ably expected that the subjects of study in the elementary 
school shall be so taught as to produce that concentration 
of mind on the task in hand which is the prime condition 
of success in anything we undertake. 

Third, it may be reasonably expected that these subjects 
shall be so taught as to call forth in every pupil a sense of 
pleasurable activity and of creative power. Probably the 
keenest pleasure the child feels in school is the pleasure of 
conquering difficulties. His nature is self-active ; and all 
education should take a lesson from the kindergarten. I 
look forward longingly to the day when, in addition to 
drawing, there shall be in all the schools some suitable 
form of manual training — woodwork for boys and sewing 
and cooking for girls. The experiment we have seen de- 
veloped in the Manual Training High School has convinced 
all who have studied it, that children may devote a consid- 
erable part of each day to manual training work, and 
not only do as much academic work as children do in 
other schools in which there is no manual training ; but 
that this work is accomplished with much less of mental 



8 EXPECTATIONS AND IDEALS 

strain, with much less danger of producing those nervous 
disorders to which all children, particularly girls, are liable 
in consequence of their school work. " The mind is less 
strained the more it reacts on what it deals with, and has 
a native play of its own, and is creative. It is more 
strained the more it has to receive a number of ' knowl- 
edges ' passively, and to store them up to be reproduced 
in an examination." 

Fourth, the teachers, and particularly the principals of 
elementary schools, should so use the subjects of the 
curriculum as to develop the inherent powers of each 
individual, and should endeavor, after careful observa- 
tion, to point the way for each child to that course of 
life for which he is best adapted. We hear continual 
plaints about the wrong distribution of wealth ; how one 
man is undeservedly rich, and another undeservedly 
poor ; and much of this is possibly true. Indeed, John- 
son's noble line is always true : — 

Slow rises worth by poverty depressed. 

But it is not nearly so much the wrong distribution of 
wealth that ails society as the wrong distribution of talent. 
The world is full of misfits, of square pegs in round holes. 
Surely it is not unreasonable to expect that the schools 
should do something toward placing the round pegs in 
the round holes and the square pegs in the square holes. 
In other words, the special bent of each child's mind 
should be carefully studied, and he should be trained for 
that kind of work for which he is best fitted. Primarily 
this duty belongs to the parent, but it is a duty in which 
the school should give valuable assistance. 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1896 9 

Fifth, it may be reasonably expected that all the school 
work shall be so conducted as to develop character. Dr. 
Harris calls attention to the four school virtues which every 
good school inculcates by its discipline : punctuality, or the 
habit of being on time for every exercise ; regularity, per- 
forming duties continuously and systematically ; silence, 
the duty of refraining from unnecessary noise so as not to 
disturb others; and industry, which maybe of two kinds — 
critical alertness toward the expression of other minds, and 
undivided attention to the task immediately in hand. It 
may be reasonably expected that the schools shall, by their 
practices, cause the growth of these habits — punctuality, 
regularity, silence, and discipline ; but if it stops short with 
these four virtues, important as they are in the formation of 
character, it will not have done its whole duty. The school 
exercises should be so conducted as to produce a love for 
all things beautiful and good. Drawing is a most useful 
art to him who possesses it ; but the teaching of drawing 
serves but a part of its purpose, if it does not lead the 
student to love nature and to understand nature through 
the interpretations made by art. Reading is necessary to 
earn a living in our modern world ; but unless the reading of 
the schools leads to a love of good literature it has nothing 
but the bread-and-butter argument to recommend it. The 
power to read may lead to all that is unholy, all that is 
impure ; or it may lead to truth, and beauty, and purity. 
The school work that does not lead to a love of good liter- 
ature, and particularly poetry, comes perilously near the 
nature of a crime. "To be incapable of a feeling of poetry 
in any sense of the word," said Wordsworth, "is to be with- 
out love of human nature and reverence for God." 



IO EXPECTATIONS AND IDEALS 

The repression of the vices of selfishness, lying, and 
dishonesty, is an. extremely difficult and delicate work for 
both parent and teacher. Equally difficult and delicate is 
the work of developing the higher virtues : truthfulness, 
generosity, and love — "the greatest thing in the world." 
It is only teachers of the rarest power who can do much, 
either in repressing the lower vices or in developing the 
higher virtues, though all may do something if they will 
be but long suffering, slow to wrath, and full of tact. Two 
things, however, are certain : first, no bad man or woman 
can ever be a good teacher ; and, second, any system of 
appointing and promoting teachers which leads to wire- 
pulling, fawning, flattery, and selfishness on the part of 
teachers, diminishes their power for good and renders 
them in all cases less serviceable, and, in some, a menace, 
to society. 

That such expectations and ideals as I have inadequately 
described are developing in our teaching force, I firmly 
believe. Upon their fuller development, not merely in 
Brooklyn, but throughout this land, more than on any 
other thing, depend the stability and the elevation of our 
republican institutions. 



II 

LITERATURE IN THE GRADES 

From this article it will be seen that Dr. Maxwell was one of the first to 
advocate the study of literature from masterpieces instead of from the dry 
compendiums or readers then in vogue in the elementary schools. 

— The Editors. 

{From the Brooklyn Report for 1888) 

IN my last report I stated that it had been decided at a 
conference held between the principals of the grammar 
schools and the Superintendent " to make the study of 
literature one of the features of the work in the graduating 
classes." I stated the reasons for this decision as follows : — 

The chief purpose of this measure is to cultivate in our children a love 
for what is pure and beautiful in literature. There is, as we know only too 
well, reading matter that is abhorrent to all that is virtuous and noble. The 
only way to prevent the minds of many children from gravitating toward 
what is debasing in literature is to cultivate the taste for what is ennobling. 
I hold that those who confer the power of reading upon children are bound 
by every moral consideration to do all that is possible to prevent that power 
becoming a minister of evil. It is hoped that the introduction of this study 
into the graduating classes will do something to effect this end. 

This, however, is not the only purpose. Hitherto it has been the custom 
to examine the pupils of the graduating classes upon the definitions of words. 
These words were selected at random from spelling books or dictionaries. 
To prepare for this examination, the teachers were obliged to have their pupils 
learn by rote necessarily defective definitions of some thousands of words. 
The result, very naturally, was, that when the children came to write their 
answers at the examination, they not infrequently attempted to fit their re- 
membered definitions to the wrong words. The result may be imagined. 

II 



12 LITERATURE IN THE GRADES 

It was often too grotesque for description in these pages. The design now is 
that the words of the reading matter shall be carefully studied, not only as 
to their meaning in the context, but as to their radical and derivative mean- 
ings. Thus the field of work is strictly defined. Time and energy will no 
longer be wasted. Teachers and pupils will learn that the vital thing is how 
to get at the meaning of words, not the number of words studied. I have a 
strong hope that the reform thus instituted — I am happy to state, with the 
unanimous approval of the principals of the grammar schools — will soon 
extend itself downward through the lower grades. 

I may here say that the experiment has resulted most 
happily. The children in our First 1 Grammar grades are 
learning to appreciate some of the beauties of literature, and 
to discriminate between what is good and wholesome in 
printed matter and what is evil and poisonous. The study, 
too, is helping their powers of expression. There has been 
a notable improvement in the compositions written at the 
graduating examinations since this study was introduced. 
A few months ago, at the request of the principals, I pre- 
pared the following plan for conducting exercises in 
critical reading, and it has been adopted in all the grammar 

schools : — 

Office of the 
Superintendent of Public Instruction, 
Brooklyn, December i, i) 



SCHEME OF WORK FOR CRITICAL STUDY OF LITERARY SELECTIONS IN THE 

FIRST GRAMMAR GRADE 

Three Readings. — Each selection should be read at least three times. 

First Reading. — This should be purely for the pleasure of the reading, 
with attention to elocution and to the general outlines of the plot. Before 
the reading is commenced, if the selection is poetry, the children should be 
instructed in the meter, and in reading should be required to emphasize the 
proper syllables, so that they may learn to appreciate the melody of rhythm. 

Second Reading. — This should be for the purpose of dividing the selection 
into parts, and for gaining conceptions of the various characters. 



1 The highest grade in an elementary school in Brooklyn was at that time 
called the First Grammar grade. — The Editors. 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1888 13 

The division should be made according to some plan, either of place or 
time, in case of a narrative; or of thought, in case of an argument or exposi- 
tion. 

The pupils should be able to give, both orally and in writing, an abstract 
of the thought or events in each of the parts into which the selection is 
divided. 

In gaining a conception of a character, the influence of one character 
upon another, or upon others, should be noted ; as well as the influence of 
the course of events upon each of the principal characters. 

In the second reading, passages should be marked for memorizing : — 

(a) Passages of striking beauty. 

($) Passages to illustrate peculiarities of the principal characters. 

(c) Passages in illustration of the rhetorical figures, simile, ??ietaphor, and 
climax. 

The memorizing of these passages should be made a regular class 
exercise. 

Third Reading. — Meaning and spelling of words; historical and geo- 
graphical allusions; parsing of words whose concords are obscure, and 
analysis of complicated sentences, to secure appreciation of the meaning; 
changing similes to metaphors, and metaphors to similes. 

One rule which the teacher should always follow in conducting an 
exercise in the critical study of literature is, not to tell the pupil anything 
that he can find out, or that he can be put in the way of finding out, for 
himself. 

Wm. H. Maxwell, 

Superintendent. 

I regret that, except in a few schools, " critical reading " 
is not pursued to any great extent in the grades below the 
First Grammar. I would suggest that in all grammar 
grades principals at the beginning of each term set apart 
some portion of the reading matter for critical study, as to 
the subject matter of the selections, their division into 
parts, the spelling and explanation of words, and the 
meaning of historical and geographical allusions. Much 
additional matter should be read, but the habit of reading 
critically should be acquired early. 

This matter of getting at the meaning of words is one in 



14 LITERATURE IN THE GRADES 

which our progress is still slow. The old habit fostered 
through so many years, of making children memorize 
so-called definitions of some thousands of words — defini- 
tions which were necessarily defective in themselves and 
which could not be accurately remembered because not 
correlated on any principle of associated ideas — still 
clings to many teachers. A rational method of leading a 
child to arrive at a conception of the meaning of a term is 
one of the last powers to be acquired by even the ablest 
teacher. The methods of explaining abstract and general 
terms, by particulars, by synonyms, and by contrasts, lie 
ready to the hand but are rarely employed ; while the 
method by derivation is an unused art. 

The derivation of words from Latin and Greek roots is 
taken up in the First grades of a few schools, but is not 
required in any. When we consider the composite charac- 
ter of the English language ; that it is composed of words 
from many languages, but chiefly from the Saxon, the 
Latin, and the Greek; and how to know the meaning of 
one Latin root may give the key to the meaning of a hun- 
dred English derivatives, it does seem that we should not 
fail to take advantage of this labor-saving measure. In- 
deed, it is not even necessary to go so far back as the 
Latin or Greek word. All that is necessary is to know 
the meaning of the most commonly used stems derived 
from Latin and Greek words. Possessed of this knowledge 
and an acquaintance with prefixes and suffixes, the scholar 
has no difficulty in getting at the literal meaning of a word, 
from which it becomes one of the most entertaining of ex- 
ercises to trace the derived meanings. I would, therefore, 
recommend that the study of a certain number of stems, 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1888 1 5 

together with prefixes and suffixes, and of familiar words 
formed from them, should be required in each of the 
grammar grades. It is not well to leave this study to the 
last year of the grammar school course. It requires 
constant practice and repetition to make it effective. It is 
not too difficult even for children of the Eighth * Grammar 
grade. An hour a week devoted to this study throughout 
the grammar course, and the utilization of the knowledge 
thus obtained in the passing explanation of terms in the 
reading lesson, would, I believe, result in an accuracy and 
certainty as to the meaning of words which now I very fre- 
quently miss even in the most carefully prepared candi- 
dates that come up for the " B " certificate examination. 

1 This was the lowest grammar grade in the schools at the time. — The 
Editors. 



Ill 

THE DUTIES OF PRINCIPALS 

Dr. Maxwell subsequently read a paper on this subject before the National 
Educational Association in 1894. See the Proceedings for that year, pp. 310- 
321. — The Editors. 

{From the Brooklyn Report for i8g2) 

AS has already been pointed out, our schools are suffer- 
ing from the presence of too many supervisors that 
are relieved from the work of teaching. And yet in many 
of our schools the supervision is neither of the right quality 
nor sufficient in quantity. Under these conditions I have 
deemed it right to make a study of the work done by our 
ablest and most energetic principals, of the work done by 
principals in other cities, and of the literature on the sub- 
ject. The result of this study is presented below in the 
form of a brief summary of the duties pertaining to the 
principal's office. 

The principal of a school ought to be held to a strict re- 
sponsibility within certain well-defined lines for the ad- 
ministration of the school or schools placed under his 
direction. He has duties to perform toward his pupils and 
those in parental relation to them, toward subordinate 
teachers, and toward his immediate official superior, the 
Superintendent. 

He should, in the first place, be an expert in school sani- 

16 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1892 1 7 

tation. It may not be well to place in the hands of a 
principal the power to expend money, to make repairs or 
alterations in the school building, but he should know 
when the condition of the building is not right and should 
make life a burden to those who have the power, until 
defects are remedied. He should have a keen eye to dis- 
cover physical weaknesses in children, such as myopia or 
astigmatism, or nervous disorders, and should be skilled 
to take measures of prevention, if not of cure. Equally 
keen should be his discernment of intellectual and moral 
defects, such as poor memory, lack of constructive ability, 
lying, dishonesty, and the like ; and in all such cases it is 
his duty to devise, if possible, a course of educational 
treatment to cure the disease. He should endeavor, with 
the aid of his teachers, to discover particular aptitudes and 
talents in his pupils and should advise with pupils and theii 
parents as to the most fruitful course of educational work. 
I do not refer in this connection merely to the power that 
ought to be vested in the principal of permitting and en- 
couraging bright pupils to advance more rapidly than their 
duller companions. That the principal ought to possess 
and exercise this power, will be conceded. I refer more 
particularly to the duty of advising as to whether, for 
instance, a child should stop going to school at the end of the 
grammar school course, as it is better for many children 
to do, or whether he should go on through the high school 
and then through college, or whether he should go to a 
literary high school, or to a manual training high school. 
It is, perhaps, doubtful if a principal has a more important 
duty toward society than this. Socialists and communists, 
and many who are not socialists as the term is commonly 



1 8 DUTIES OF PRINCIPALS 

understood, and who are not communists, complain of the 
dreadful inequalities in the distribution of wealth. They 
point to the extremes of poverty and wealth, and denounce 
the conditions of society which gave them birth or which 
permit them to exist. . The discontent engendered finds 
vent in all sorts of ridiculous and impossible schemes, 
from a prohibitory tariff to absolute free trade, from the 
nationalization of land to an enforced equal division of 
wealth. But it may well be doubted whether inequalities 
in the distribution of wealth work as much evil as inequal- 
ities in the distribution of talent. It is not at all improb- 
able, even, that the wrong distribution of wealth maybe in 
no small degree due to the wrong distribution of talent. 
There are college professors who ought certainly to be 
making shoes or building fences ; there are shoemakers 
who have by nature all the mental and moral qualities to 
fit them for college professorships. There are principals 
of schools who ought to be selling ribbons ; there are men 
selling ribbons who ought to be principals of schools. 
There are men in the pulpit who ought to be driving 
reaping machines ; there are men driving reaping machines 
who ought to be in the pulpit. What a change there 
would be, not merely in the distribution of wealth, not 
merely in the increase in the product of labor, but in the 
happiness, the morality, the general well-being of mankind, 
if every man could be set to that kind of work which he 
can do best ! There is no man in the community who can 
do so much to insure the right distribution of talent as the 
schoolmaster, if he will but study his pupils and give 
honest advice to parents. High schools, colleges, and 
professional schools of all kinds might be saved from the 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1892 1 9 

weary and impossible task of endeavoring to educate the 
unfitted or the incompetent, if principals and teachers 
would seek earnestly to discover the special bents of their 
pupils' minds and advise their education along appropriate 
lines. 

Toward the teacher, the principal's duties are manifold. 
He should know the plan of work in every class. He 
should know exactly what every teacher is teaching and 
how she is teaching it. These two things he may find out 
by inspection and examinations ; not stated examinations, 
but sporadic tests used as elements in teaching. The 
principal who has to wait until the end of a month or the 
end of a year to determine by a written examination 
whether a given stint of work has been accomplished, is 
lazy and inefficient. The stated monthly examination by 
the principal is probably responsible for more machine 
teaching, more injurious cramming, than all other causes 
combined. The only proper way for a principal to find 
out what and how his teachers are teaching, is by the 
diligent exercise of his eyes and his ears. He should in- 
spect by listening to recitations and by examination of the 
.pupils' written work in language and other subjects. I 
have known the language work of a large school to be 
revolutionized in a few weeks by the principal's requiring 
his teachers to send to his office the children's written 
exercises, after they had been corrected, but before they 
were returned to the writers. The principal's inspection 
should be hourly, daily. In it, or in allied work, he should 
spend his entire time during school hours. When we con. 
sider that a principal is required to work only five hours a 
day, five days in the week, during about nine months in 



20 DUTIES OF PRINCIPALS 

the year, it is not too much to ask that all such labor as 
preparation for school exercises, the keeping of records, 
and the like should be done outside of the regular school 
hours. 

"The ever present question," which the principal should 
seek to determine, says Colonel Parker, " should be : Are 
these pupils doing that work in the most economical man- 
ner, which is immediately needed by them for their growth 
and development ? " This question the principal should 
seek to determine not only absolutely with regard to the 
work of each teacher with her class, but also relatively with 
regard to the teachers above her and the teachers below 
her. In the Brooklyn system of schools, each pupil passes 
through fifteen grades in as many half years and receives 
instruction from as many teachers. The child receives 
his knowledge of arithmetic, for example, at the hands of 
fifteen teachers. It goes without saying that in passing 
through this course, in changing from one teacher to 
another, much time is lost, much energy is wasted. It is 
one of the most important duties of the principal to reduce 
this waste to a minimum by taking care that the change 
be made with as little friction as possible and by unifying 
the work of all his teachers in each subject of the course. 
The principal should see to it that all the studies in any 
given grade are properly correlated, that the energy of 
the pupil is not diverted from the line of least resistance 
every time he changes teachers. 

But, if economy of energy in attaining given results is 
the object which the principal should have in view, and if 
inspection and frequent oral examination are the means 
by which he is to determine what and how his teachers 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1892 21 

are teaching, what are the means by which he is to correct 
faults, to institute better methods, and to stimulate enthu- 
siasm ? The chief means are three: — 

1. Private criticism — pointing out to a teacher privately 
— never in the presence of others — what her shortcomings 
are and how they may be amended. The principal who 
reports against a teacher without having first made him- 
self thoroughly familiar with the defects in her work and, 
secondly, having given her abundant warning, criticism, 
and assistance, fails utterly in his duty. 

2. The second means by which a principal may improve 
the work of his teachers is by giving model lessons. As 
Colonel Parker well says : " A principal should be thor- 
oughly capable of giving model lessons in every grade in 
his school and upon every subject taught." 

3. The third means is the teachers' meeting. The 
teachers' meetings should be of two kinds : (1) the general 
meeting of all the teachers in the school ; (2) special meet- 
ings with teachers by grades. 

The general meeting should be devoted partly to the 
discussion of general questions of discipline, promotion, 
and the like, that concern all the teachers, and partly to 
the discussion of fundamental principles of education, and 
clothing these principles with concrete illustrations. The 
best way to conduct such a meeting I believe to be that 
by which John Stuart Mill, George Grote, and their asso- 
ciates studied logic and political economy. " Our first 
subject," says Mr. Mill, " was political economy. We 
chose some systematic treatise as our textbook ; my father's 
' Elements ' being our first choice. One of us read aloud 
a chapter, or some smaller portion of the book. The dis- 



22 DUTIES OF PRINCIPALS 

cussion was then opened, and any one who had an objection 
or other remark to make, made it. Our rule was to discuss 
thoroughly every point raised, whether great or small, pro- 
longing the discussion until all who took part were satisfied 
with the conclusion they had individually arrived at ; and 
to follow up every topic of collateral speculation which 
the chapter or the conversation suggested, never leaving 
it until we had untied every knot which we found. We 
repeatedly kept up the discussion of some one point for 
several weeks, thinking intently on it during the intervals 
of our meetings, and contriving solutions of the new diffi- 
culties which had risen up in the last morning's discussion." 
If the discussion of sound works on pedagogy and psy- 
chology were carried on in this manner under the direction 
of a thoughtful, energetic principal, each teacher would 
almost necessarily become a thinker and a discoverer of 
truth. Until a teacher has learned to think for herself 
and to discover truth for herself, she will not be able to 
teach her pupils to think and discover truth for themselves. 
If, on the other hand, the principal conducts these meet- 
ings by assigning lessons to be studied and recited, as by 
a class of pupils, he is probably doing nothing more than 
setting a conspicuous example of bad teaching and dis- 
gusting his teachers with the study of professional 
literature. 

The grade meeting, on the other hand, should be for the 
consideration of plans of teaching. To make this work 
effective and of permanent value, or, if it be inefficient and 
valueless, to prove its worthlessness, there should be kept 
a grade book for each grade in which would be entered 
complete outlines of the work in each subject and sugges- 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1892 23 

tions as to methods. If this book be kept systematically, 
if the results of experiments are carefully noted down, if 
whatever is found to be faulty in method is so marked 
and a better plan substituted, the book becomes the most 
valuable " manual " of work for the teacher. The time 
has gone by when 'it was thought necessary to have teach- 
ing done in a uniform manner in accordance with a manual 
issued from the superintendent's office. The grade manual 
should be prepared by the teachers of the grade under 
the supervision of the principal, should not be printed, and 
should be amended whenever new light is thrown either 
on the subject or on the method. 

Other ways there are, no doubt, of improving teachers' 
work. Commissioner Harris has pointed out somewhere 
that the art of turning a poor teacher into a good teacher 
is a heaven-sent gift which some principals possess, but 
which it is often impossible to explain. But these three 
methods — private criticism, the giving of model lessons, 
and teachers' meetings — general meetings and grade 
meetings — are means that ought to be employed by all 
principals. 

Toward the superintendent, the principal has duties to 
perform as well as toward his subordinate teachers. They 
are at least four : — 

1. To carry out faithfully and to the best of his ability 
all rules and orders. An army of teachers can no more 
be managed without rules and orders than an army of 
soldiers. 

2. To try such experiments as the superintendent may 
suggest and to report faithfully the results. In this way 
the principal becomes the most efficient aid to the super- 






24 DUTIES OF PRINCIPALS 

intendent either in bringing into general use a good method 
or in preventing the spread of a bad method. 

3. To report to the superintendent every new idea or 
device that he (the principal) has found to work well in 
his school, so that the superintendent may carry it to other 
schools. 

4. Lastly, and perhaps most important of all, at stated 
intervals, the principal should report faithfully, honestly, 
and without fear or favor, on the efficiency of every 
teacher under his charge. When a teacher is too igno- 
rant or too indifferent to do effective work, when she is 
beyond the reach of supervision, it is the duty of the 
principal to say so firmly and manfully, and then if the 
superintendent finds the principal's judgment correct, the 
inefficient teacher should be removed by the board of 
education. 

In all this work belonging to the principal, there is one 
danger he is particularly liable to fall into — the danger of 
training his teachers to be, or of permitting them to 
become, mere machines. There is no more serious obstacle 
to progress than the principal who insists on teachers 
doing everything exactly in the way he prescribes; who 
will not permit a teacher to think for herself. Against 
this peril he must be constantly on his guard. When it 
becomes or threatens to become a real peril, it is one of 
the first duties of the superintendent to step in and secure 
to the class teacher that reasonable liberty of thought and 
action, without which no teaching can be effective, no 
system of schools can be progressive. 



IV 
THE KINDERGARTEN 

The tables upon which Dr. Maxwell founded his argument for the estab- 
lishment of public kindergartens in Brooklyn show that as early as 1887 he 
began to tabulate the ages of pupils in the public schools and thus to lay the 
foundation for the researches that have since been made in the matters of 
" retardation " and " over-age " children. They also show the small beginnings 
of the high school system of Brooklyn in the so-called Central Grammar 
School, — an institution which occupied an altogether unsuitable hired 
building, which had a course of study of only two years, and in which no 
foreign languages were taught. — The Editors. 

{From the Annual Report of the Superintendent of Public Instruction, Brook- 
lyn, for 1887} 

THE noticeable thing about the statistics 1 relating to 
the ages of children in the grades is that, notwith- 
standing the rule of the Board, that, in admitting children, 
the older should be given the preference, the number 
between five and six years of age has increased since 1886, 
the proportion for that year being 3. n per cent of the 
whole number, while for 1887 it was 3.19 per cent of the 
whole number. Unfortunately, and, I believe, unjustly, 
the Board has made, to some extent at least, the positions 
and salaries of heads of departments dependent on the 
number of children under their care. While this rule con- 
tinues in force, a premium is placed upon crowding the 

1 In the report two tables were given. — The Editors. 

2 5 



2 6 THE KINDERGARTEN 

lowest grades with children that would, as a rule, be better 
off out of school. 

These figures should be considered in connection with 
those which give by grades the number of pupils of each 
age. 

From a study of these statistics it will be seen that the 
whole number of children between the ages of five and six 
was 2407 ; that of these 2245 were in the Seventh Primary 
grade, 1 while the average age of the children in that 
grade is 7.1 years. Now, in the statistics, it appears that 
the average attendance in the Seventh Primary grade for 
the year 1887 was 10,558, while the average attendance to 
a class was 67. Assuming that 2245 fairly represents — 
and I think it is rather under than over the mark — the 
average attendance for the year of children between five and 
six years, the proportion of the number of such children to 
the whole average attendance in the Seventh Primary 
would have been 20.9 per cent. If, then, all the children 
between the ages of five and six had been excluded from 
school during the year 1887, the average attendance in the 
Seventh Primary grade would have been reduced to 53. 
It will thus be seen that there need be no difficulty in doing 
away, after a reasonable time, with the half-day classes 
and reducing the classes in the lower primary grades to 
working dimensions. All that is necessary is to enforce 
the existing rule that the older pupils shall be given the 
preference* and to fix a date in the future, after which no 
class shall have on register more than 60 pupils. 

The objection may here be raised that as the state law 

1 The Seventh Primary grade was then the name given in Brooklyn to 
the lowest grade. —The EDITORS, 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1887 27 

makes the legal school age from five to twenty-one years, the 
Board of Education has no right to exclude from the public 
schools any child within these limits. But the Board of 
Education certainly has the right to make the best possible 
use of the facilities at its disposal ; and, if it can be shown, 
as I believe it can, that the interests of the schools and the 
interests of the children themselves will be best subserved 
by such exclusion, the Board will act entirely within its 
rights. The proposition, however, is not to exclude abso- 
lutely, but only in cases where there is not room for any 
but children above six years of age ; and certainly the 
equitable right of the Board to secure the best possible 
results and to prevent the evils that flow from crowding 
and from overtaxing the physical and intellectual faculties 
of very young children, is much stronger than the legal 
power to admit to the schools children of any age. 

The legal objection, if it be of any value, might be offset 
by a measure which would be of enormous practical utility 
— the establishment of kindergarten schools for the recep- 
tion of children between five and six years of age. Some 
years ago St. Louis established such schools, and more re- 
cently Philadelphia followed the example thus set. The 
following excerpt from the report of Superintendent Long, 
of St. Louis, is evidence of the results obtained by the in- 
troduction of the system in that city : — 

That the kindergarten system is naturally an expensive system cannot 
be denied; but the cost has been kept within somewhat moderate limits 
by the low salaries paid the teachers (the lowest in the schools), and the 
"supply fee" of $2 per annum, paid by such pupils as can afford it, has a little 
more than paid for the apparatus and materials used. 

The extra cost of the kindergarten system, however, is not fairly repre- 
sented by the amount expended for salaries of kindergarten teachers, $33,700, 



28 THE KINDERGARTEN 

estimated for the current year, unless it is assumed that if the system did not 
exist, none of the children now in the kindergartens would be in the school 
at all. The extra cost, therefore, depends upon what the Board would do with 
the kindergarten children without the kindergartens. Under the present sys- 
tem, children between five and six years of age attend the kindergartens only, 
and those between six and seven attend the kindergarten and regular primary 
one half day each. If the Board educated those of the children between six 
and seven all day in the regular primary, excluding those under six, the saving 
over the present system would be about $20,000, while if it educated in the 
regular primary all the kindergarten pupils, including those under six, the 
saving over the present system would only be about $Sooo. 

Thus a large part of the expense of the kindergartens is due to the early 
age (five years) at which children are admitted; but it is in the fact that the 
kindergarten system (by whatever name it is called), renders practicable and 
profitable this earlier commencement and therefore longer duration of the 
school life, that I consider its greatest recommendation lies. It is true that 
in localities where the school life of the children is not limited by necessity, 
this consideration may not be important; and judging from observation in 
such localities alone, it might be difficult to sustain the utility of the kinder- 
gartens as a part of the public school system. But there is another very large 
class in our great cities, whom necessity compels to begin the work of life as 
" breadwinners " while yet children, and for these, our future citizens, the 
earlier commencement of the school life, under the refining, educating influ- 
ences of the kindergarten system (by whatever name it is called), is amply 
justified by the gravest considerations of public policy. 

It may justly be claimed for the kindergarten system that 
it trains children to habits of obedience and fixed attention ; 
that it makes the eye more accurate, the hand more steady ; 
that it teaches to count, and develops ideas of color and 
form ; that it leads to imitation and invention in drawing 
and design ; that it quickens the sensibilities and sharpens 
the intelligence. If these claims are well founded, it will 
readily be seen how much better prepared children would 
be to enter upon our grade work after a year of such 
training, than they are at present. The foundation of 
good habits, both moral and intellectual, would be laid 
deep and strong. 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1887 29 

I would not, however, have any child remain more than 
a year in the kindergarten school, for the system has its 
limitations which the educator is bound to recognize. The 
child plays, and learns unconsciously, through his play; 
but if the play is continued too long, it begets a habit that is 
fatal to the acquisition of the habit of work. Superintend- 
ent Harris wrote wisely in one of his St. Louis reports : 
"If serious occupation is made into childish play, the result 
is that the stage of irrationality is prolonged. If play is 
suppressed and serious tasks imposed upon the child beyond 
his ability, the elasticity of youth is broken, and a mechan- 
ical drudge is developed. The necessity of play to children 
is found in the function it subserves. In play, the child acts 
directly for himself, while in work he suppresses his own 
subjective inclination for the production of what is useful 
for others. Play and work should be carefully kept 
distinct in his mind, and their due proportion carefully 
preserved. Without work the child learns to know only 
his caprice, his arbitrary likes and dislikes, and he is train- 
ing himself for a tyrant. Without play he is learning to 
have no will of his own and no personal interest in any- 
thing — he will become a selfish drudge." 

One year, therefore, would be as much as the average 
child should spend in the kindergarten, but it would be a 
year well spent. 

The only argument in favor of the present system is 
that even though children between five and six years do 
not learn much, they are at least kept off the streets, and 
away from evil associations for a time. There is force in 
this, but it would be swept away by the establishment of 
kindergartens. 



30 



THE KINDERGARTEN 



In the cities I have referred to — St. Louis and Phila- 
delphia — the kindergarten schools were established largely 
through the munificence of private individuals and societies, 
though they are now under the control of the educational 
authorities. Such is, probably, the way in which they 
will come, if they ever do come, in Brooklyn. And let it 
not be thought a thing incredible that this should happen. 
Brooklyn has many wealthy and liberal citizens. Several 
of them have already distinguished themselves by magnifi- 
cent gifts to educational institutions at home and in other 
cities. One has given a splendid endowment to the 
library of Yale College. And one, it is gratifying to 
know, has built and endowed, entirely at his own cost, 
here in Brooklyn, the largest and most fully equipped 
school for manual training in the United States. Yet it is 
doubtful if either a college library or an industrial school 
would be of as much benefit to the people of this city as 
would a well-organized system of kindergarten schools. 
More than one half the children who now enter our schools 
leave before they are twelve years of age. The average 
duration of their school life is less than five years. 
Kindergarten schools would extend this term by one year, 
and probably increase by one third the ability of the 
pupil to profit by the work of the graded school. He 
would begin earlier; he would advance more rapidly. 

(From the Brooklyn Report for 1889) 

In former reports, I have dwelt at some length on the 
advantage of kindergarten training for very young chil- 
dren. It ought not to be necessary to recapitulate the 
arguments in its favor. Suffice it to say that all thought- 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1889 3 1 

ful educators are now agreed as to two propositions : first, 
that six is a sufficiently early age at which to begin the 
teaching of such subjects as reading and arithmetic; and 
second, that the years between four and six are most 
profitably spent in a kindergarten class. 

Many of our large cities have incorporated kindergarten 
classes in their school systems — notably, St. Louis and 
Philadelphia. In both of these cities, the kindergarten 
classes were first established by private munificence, and 
afterwards, when their usefulness was demonstrated, the 
classes passed under the control of the Board of Educa- 
tion. The history of this movement in Philadelphia, as 
given by Superintendent MacAlister, furnishes an admi- 
rable illustration of what a few public-spirited men and 
women can do to aid in the cause of common-school 
education. 

A few ladies and gentlemen, feeling the need of doing something for the 
education of a class of young children which the public schools did not reach, 
came together in 1879, and commenced the work in a quiet, unostentatious 
way. A kindergarten was started in the public school at Twenty-second and 
Locust streets, six persons subscribing $100 each to defray the expenses. 
Other kindergartens were opened, and the movement progressed to such an 
extent that in 1 881, the Sub-Primary School Society was incorporated to care 
for the growing enterprise. Under its management the work grew so rapidly 
that in 1883 an appeal was made to Councils, which resulted in an appropria- 
tion of $5000 for the maintenance of free kindergartens. In 1885 the appro- 
priation was increased to $7500 ; the Sub-Primary School Society meanwhile 
raising by voluntary subscriptions a sum almost equal to that granted by the 
city. These appropriations were expended under the direction of the Board 
of Public Education, which thus came to stand as a sort of foster father to the 
kindergartens. It was but one step farther to the adoption of the kinder- 
gartens by the Board. In 1886 Councils added the sum of $15,000 to the 
school budget for the support of kindergartens, and on the first day of Jan- 
uary, 1887, they passed from the control of the Sub-Primary School Society 
to the Board of Public Education and became an integral part of the educa- 
tional system of the city. 



32 THE KINDERGARTEN 

Similar movements, with fair prospects of success, have 
recently been started in both Brooklyn and New York. 
I sincerely hope, however, that the Board of Education 
will not wait for private enterprise to inaugurate this re- 
form. Had we teachers trained in kindergarten work, it 
would be perfectly feasible to start kindergarten classes 
at once in several schools in the older parts of the city. 
In the schools I have in mind, there are now many vacant 
seats. By the consolidation of existing classes, two or 
three rooms could be obtained for kindergartens in each 
school. The only real obstacle in the way of this is the 
difficulty of finding trained kindergarten teachers. To 
place kindergarten classes under untrained teachers would 
be worse than useless. I would respectfully recommend, 
therefore, that two kindergarten classes be established in 
the Training School, and that salaries sufficiently high be 
paid to obtain the two best kindergarten teachers in the 
country. A postgraduate course of a few months might 
then be established for those of the Training School grad- 
uates who have exhibited particular ability for this kind of 
work. 

From the members of the postgraduate class, teachers 
could be appointed for kindergarten classes in other schools 
as it would be found practicable to establish them. Of 
course it would be necessary to pay the teachers of such 
classes sufficiently high salaries to induce them to spend 
the necessary time in preparation. 

If we can add from one to two years to the time children 
spend — in the great majority of cases now quite insufficient 
— in acquiring those qualities of mind and heart that lead 
to happiness and success in life, and we can do this, as I 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1891 33 

believe we can, at comparatively trifling cost and without 
interfering with any other necessary part of our educa- 
tional system, it is surely our duty to do it. Furthermore, 
I believe that kindergarten work should be introduced in 
the Training School with a view to its introduction in all 
schools. I shall close this discussion by quoting the elo- 
quent words of Superintendent MacAlister : — 

The secret of the kindergarten is that it never loses sight of the fact that 
it is dealing with the undeveloped, untrained powers of a little child. It 
develops the body ; it cultivates the senses ; it strengthens the receptive, and 
calls into operation the active, faculties of the mind ; it trains the social feel- 
ings and makes each member of the little society feel that its happiness de- 
pends not upon itself alone, but is bound up with that of all its members. 
And all this is done by treating the child, not as a machine to be set in motion 
by the teacher, but as a living, spiritual organism which grows by the free use 
of its own powers, which gathers force from every effort that it puts forth, and 
which passes by insensible degrees from the spontaneous play of feelings and 
desires, to the conscious exercise of faculties that find expression in creating 
and doing, in the production of forms that are alike useful and beautiful, in 
the performance of acts that are inspired by love and duty. 



{From the Brooklyn Report for i8gi} 

In my former reports I have endeavored to set forth 
the advantages of the kindergarten for children of a tender 
age. Educational experts are now almost a unit in insist- 
ing on kindergarten work for children under six years of 
age, if such children are to be in school at all. I believe 
it is perfectly feasible to establish, kindergarten classes 
in several of our schools. In the older sections of the 
city classes might be consolidated in some schools so as 
to make room for kindergartens. In other schools where 
there are four or five classes of the lowest primary grade, 
the children under six years of age might be collected 



34 THE KINDERGARTEN 

into one or two of these classes and taught by kinder- 
garten teachers. 

The first school in which a kindergarten class should 
be established is the Training School for Teachers. This 
should be a model class, so that even if we should not 
go to the length of training kindergartners, we might be 
able to impart something of the kindergarten spirit to all 
our young teachers. 

It would be a mistake, in my judgment, to establish 
kindergarten classes under any but thoroughly competent 
and trained kindergartners. In order to obtain such 
teachers it would probably be necessary to make provision 
for the granting of special certificates for kindergarten work, 
as is now done in the case of specialists in the high schools. 

As soon as the work attained sufficient dimensions to 
warrant the expense, a special supervisor of kindergarten 
work would be needed. 

{From the Brooklyn Report for i8g2) 

For the first time in the history of public education in 
Brooklyn, the word " kindergarten " was, in the year 
1892, embodied in the by-laws of the Board of Education. 
The formation of a model kindergarten class in the Train- 
ing School for Teachers was authorized. That class has 
been established and is now in successful operation. The 
object is not to train kindergarten teachers — for that 
work we are not yet prepared — but to give the pupil- 
teachers an opportunity to observe the workings of the 
system and to imbibe something of its beneficent spirit. 

I cannot but regard this event as one of the first impor- 
tance. I cannot permit myself to doubt that, small as is 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1892 35 

the beginning, the seed thus planted will grow until there 
will be a kindergarten established in connection with 
every primary school and department in Brooklyn. All 
who believe in making little children happy, in training 
them to habits of forbearance and self-reliance, of industry 
and frugality, of justice and kindness, will strive for this 
consummation. 

There is grave danger, however, of making a fatal error 
in the initial steps. The proposition has been made that a 
number of the existing Seventh Primary classes should be 
converted into so-called kindergarten classes under their 
present teachers. The idea is that some of the kinder- 
garten " gifts " should be used side by side with the 
regular grade work. Those who advocate this plan lose 
sight, however, of two all-important considerations : (a) 
the pure kindergarten is in its very nature adapted only 
to children between the ages of three and six; and (b) the 
teachers of the Seventh Primary classes, excellent as they 
may be, have had no special training for kindergarten 
work. The gifts and games of the kindergarten are 
suited for children before the age at which reading, 
writing, and arithmetic are taught. As the violin is 
admirable only when played by a virtuoso, so the kinder- 
garten is a blessing only when taught by one who has the 
requisite skill. 

I recommend, therefore, that in all schools in which a 
vacant room can be found, a kindergarten class, under a 
trained kindergartner, be established ; and, as soon as 
classes in sufficient number to warrant the expenditure 
shall have been established, that a special supervisor, or 
director of kindergarten work, be appointed. 



36 THE KINDERGARTEN 

AFTER TEN YEARS 
(From the Brooklyn Report for 1896) 

An appropriation of $12,000 for the establishment of 
kindergarten classes was made by the Board of Estimate 
in 1895 and became available on January 1, 1896. The 
Committee on Kindergartens is now engaged in selecting 
a supervisor of kindergartens. It is hoped, when the 
schools open in September, to organize twelve or fifteen 
kindergartens in rooms not now occupied by regular 
classes. ... It gives me special pleasure to participate 
in the work of planting the kindergarten in the public 
schools of Brooklyn, as for the last ten years I have been 
earnestly advocating this measure. 

RESULTS OF KINDERGARTEN WORK 

(From the First Annual Report of the City Superintendent of Schools, Greater 

New York, i8g8) 

The total number of kindergarten classes in the city is 
one hundred and one, distributed as follows : — 

Manhattan and The Bronx 65 

Brooklyn ........... 21 

Queens . . . . . . . ' . . . 13 

Richmond ......... 2 

In these kindergarten classes teachers are employed as 
follows : — 

Manhattan and The Bronx ...... 65 

Brooklyn 38 

Queens . . . . . . . . . .21 

Richmond ......... 2 

Brooklyn is the only borough in which the kindergarten 
classes are organized in the orthodox fashion with a direc- 
tor and an assistant in each class. Some of the kinder- 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1898 37 

gartens in Queens are organized in this way. All of 
the kindergartens in Manhattan and The Bronx and in 
Richmond have but one teacher in each class. Presumably 
the plan of organization in the two last mentioned boroughs 
was adopted for reasons of economy. It is not a good 
plan, however. One kindergartner cannot successfully 
carry on the prescribed work of a kindergarten class. 
She cannot, for instance, successfully provide music and 
lead a game at the same time. Expert opinion is over- 
whelmingly in favor of the plan by which each regular 
kindergartner is provided with one or more assistants. 
When kindergarten training departments shall have been 
organized in the New York and Brooklyn training schools 
for teachers, it will be possible to provide these assistants 
at a nominal cost from among the kindergartners in train- 
ing. In the meantime, I recommend that each regular 
kindergartner be provided with at least one paid assistant. 
The increased efficiency of the kindergartens that would 
result, would far more than compensate for the increased 
outlay. 

During the past year the question has been raised 
whether the kindergarten is accomplishing all or nearly 
all that its advocates have claimed. It has been boldly 
asserted that the children who have experienced its train- 
ing are found to be no better, often worse, fitted for the 
studies of the elementary school than children who have 
not had such training ; that they do not want to do any- 
thing but play, are restive under discipline, indisposed to 
learn the lesson which every child must learn — that one 
must do many things he does not want to do — and almost 
incapable of voluntary attention, without which there can 



38 THE KINDERGARTEN 

be no sound intellectual or moral training. While many 
of these criticisms have come from persons who are mere 
surface observers, the voice of one of highest authority, 
President G. Stanley Hall, has been raised not to over- 
throw, but to reform, the kindergarten. " The lines laid 
down by Froebel," he says, " have been too narrowly 
adhered to, to the exclusion of other great educators ; the 
gifts and occupations, and now, worst of all, the sometimes 
preposterous mother plays, are made the centers of un- 
ending metaphysical cobweb spinning, to the exclusion of 
a vast body of new educational ideas and practices which 
would bring the kindergartens more closely in touch with 
the educational life of the present." * Under these cir- 
cumstances it seemed worth while to find out the opinions 
of the principals of schools in which kindergartens are 
established, and of the teachers of first-year classes, who 
have received pupils directly from kindergartens, as to 
how, during the first year of the elementary school, the 
work of the kindergarten child compares with the work of 
the child who has come directly from the home. At my 
request the Borough Superintendents sent to all schools 
having kindergarten classes a number of questions regard- 
ing the work of kindergarten children. 

A careful study of the answers of principals and of at 
least one teacher in each school which, in the majority of 
cases, reflect great credit on the writers, seems to warrant 
the following conclusions : — 

1. The opinions of the principals and teachers who have 
had direct contact with kindergarten children are over- 
whelmingly in favor of the kindergarten. 

1 The Outlook, August, 1899, p. 769. 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1898 39 

2. The benefits of the kindergarten are not confined to 
those children who have had the kindergarten training. 
Such children unconsciously do missionary work among 
their fellows in the higher grades. 

3. If the kindergarten is to be thoroughly effective and 
yield a proper return for the money spent upon it, children 
under six years of age should remain in it not less than one 
year. There should be a rule to this effect, and promotions 
from the kindergarten should not be left to the whim or 
caprice of a principal. In the boroughs of Manhattan and 
The Bronx, for instance, in the majority of the kinder- 
gartens, the pupils remain less than half a year. In the 
borough of Queens, from which the testimony is unani- 
mously in favor of the kindergarten, the pupils invariably 
spend a year in that class. 

4. The greatest care must be taken in the selection of 
kindergarten teachers. A kindergarten under a weak 
teacher is worse than useless, because the pupils are at their 
most impressionable age. Much of the adverse criticism 
found in the replies undoubtedly arises from poor kinder- 
garten teaching. 

5. The kindergartners need to take to heart President 
Hall's advice to endeavor to " bring the kindergarten more 
closely in touch with the educational life of the present." 

6. Some principals and first-year teachers, it is only too 
manifest, need to study the aims, the principles, and the 
practices, of the kindergarten. 

7. The discipline of repression, as distinguished from the 
discipline of " liberty under law " which still prevails, I am 
sorry to say, in many New York schools, is so utterly op- 
posed to the spirit of the kindergarten, that it is small 



40 THE KINDERGARTEN 

wonder that teachers whose chief mission in life seems to 
be to repress all spontaneity in their pupils, can find noth- 
ing to commend and much to condemn in the kindergarten. 
They do not realize that for several years play is the child's 
chief work. 

8. Kindergartners are too apt to forget that one of the 
great missions of all schools is to inculcate the virtues of 
punctuality, order, and industry. 

9. There is need in all schools of a subprimary class that 
will form, in schools having kindergartens, a connecting 
link between the kindergarten and the grades, and in 
schools not having kindergartens will to some extent take 
its place. The transition from the kindergarten to the low- 
est primary class is too abrupt. 

CROWDING IN FIRST-YEAR CLASSES 

The opinion is frequently expressed in the letters quoted 
above that children under six years of age are too immature 
to attempt the regular work of the grades. With this 
opinion I am in most thorough accord. Children at six 
are, as a rule, fit only to enter the subprimary class of 
which I have just spoken. Under six years of age, if at 
school at all, children should be in kindergarten classes. 
Every child under six should be excluded from the grades, 
and the most rigorous measures should be adopted to se- 
cure correct information about a child's age before he is 
admitted. Children under six who desire to attend school 
should be placed in kindergarten classes. Wherever neces- 
sary, rooms should be hired for this purpose ; or still better, 
special kindergarten buildings should be erected. This 
scheme furnishes the most hopeful means of relieving the 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1898 41 

horribly crowded condition of the first-year classes. The 
chief cause of overcrowding is that children who have no 
business with grade work — children under six years of age 
— are admitted to the first-year classes. Exclude these 
children and provide kindergartens for them, and the prob- 
lem is largely solved. 

Note. — The recommendation made by Dr. Maxwell that children under 
six should be excluded from the grades was realized in 1902 when the city 
charter of 1901 went into effect. That instrument (Section 1056) contains 
the provision " that no child under six years of age shall be received in said 
schools except in kindergarten classes." 

It is interesting to find that in April, 191 2, the public school kindergartens 
of Greater New York had increased to 845, with 30,278 pupils. — The Editors. 



V 
MANUAL TRAINING IN THE GRADES 

When Dr. Maxwell first took up the subject of manual training in 1S87, it 
is evident that his mind was still uncertain as to its educational value. He 
was certainly not disposed to accept without demonstration the extravagant 
claims then put forward in its favor. The following extracts show how he 
gradually proceeded from doubt to certainty. — The Editors. 



E 



(From the Brooklyn Report for j88?) 

MERSON, in his essay on Art, says : — 

The child not only suffers, but cries; not only hungers, but eats. The 
man not only thinks, but speaks and acts. Every thought that arises in the mind, 
in its rising aims to pass out of the mind into act; just as every plant, in the 
moment of germination, struggles up to light. Thought is the seed of action; 
but action is as much its second form as thought is its first. It rises in 
thought, to the end that it may be uttered and acted. The more profound 
the thought, the more burdensome. Always in proportion to the depth of its 
sense does it knock importunately at the gates of the soul, to be spoken, to be 
done. What is in, will out. It struggles to the birth. Speech is a great 
pleasure, and action a great pleasure; they cannot be foreborne. 

Stripped of its poetical dress this passage expresses the 
truth that thought must needs find means of expression ; 
and that the means is of two kinds — speech and action. 
By action is meant either pursuing a line of conduct or 
embodying an idea in concrete form, as a piece of sculp- 
ture or architecture. Thus a Dante gives expression to his 
thought in the " speech "of the " Divina Commedia " ; a Na- 
poleon, in the "action " of planning a campaign or fighting 
a battle; a Michael Angelo in the "action" of chiseling 

42 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 18S7 43 

the statue of Moses or painting the Sistine Chapel. The 
advocates of manual training, or what is sometimes called 
industrial education, claim that it is as essential to train 
the hand to express thought by " action " as it is to train 
the power of speech. This, however, is a much more 
logical statement of the position which the advocates of 
manual training may successfully maintain than that which 
they usually adopt. Thus I find John D. Ford, U. S. N., 
Principal of the Baltimore City Manual Training School, 
stating boldly that " the training of eye and hand is as im- 
portant as that of the brain " ; and that " a boy is learning 
as much when he is swinging the sledge as when he is 
studying the rules of proportion." A little reflection 
would have shown the gentleman that, as the brain guides 
the hand, brain training and hand training are not to be 
contrasted nor even separated ; and that unless the boy 
has planned something in his head which he is striving to 
execute with his hands he learns no more by swinging a 
a sledge than he would by swinging a dumb-bell. In other 
words, it is the expression of thought in action that trains, 
not the mere action itself. 

Somewhat more logical is what Superintendent Compton, 
of Toledo, Ohio, says of manual training : — 

It is purely educational in its object. It first teaches the pupils to portray 
in the drawing a variety of beautiful and useful forms, and then to embody 
these forms in wood, clay, and metals. It teaches how to express thought, not 
in words alone, but in things. It produces nothing for the market except 
well-trained minds, seeing eyes, and skillful hands. 

And again : — 

It dignifies and exalts labor, and teaches respect for the laboring man; it 
teaches no special trade and yet lays the foundation for any trade, and gives 
the youth such knowledge and skill that he becomes a sounder and better 
judge of men and things in whatever business or profession he may engage. 



44 MANUAL TRAINING IN THE GRADES 

Ignoring the obvious non sequitur in the last clause of 
the last sentence quoted, we may remark that the sweep- 
ing generalization contained in the first part of the quota- 
tion is founded upon but a meager field of observation. 
Superintendent Compton is himself the authority for the 
statement that only 300 boys in the great city of Toledo 
are in attendance upon the manual training school. In all 
probability these boys were selected, or they elected, to 
attend the school because of a special aptitude for this kind 
of work. At any rate, it will be wise to wait for more ex- 
tended observation and more careful experiment, before 
accepting so wide an induction. Moreover, there is ambi- 
guity in the statement. " It teaches how to express 
thought." What thought ? The pupil's own ? If so, 
the conclusion is at least partially true. But if the thought 
of another, it is probably false; for in that case — the 
case of reproducing a model — what the pupil is learning 
is, not to express his own thought, in which the value of 
the training lies, but the purely mechanical part of the 
work in which there is iittle or no training. To illustrate : 
A boy designs a box of a certain pattern and then makes 
it with the tools at his disposal. Here is training, because 
it is the expression of thought in " action." But if, on the 
other hand, the work is planing a board to a given thick- 
ness, he may perform the task with the utmost accuracy 
and yet not have his mind quickened in the slightest 
degree. I do not say that learning. to plane a board is not 
a good discipline. It is a good discipline, as far as it goes ; 
but the question for the educator to consider is whether 
this discipline, altogether necessary to the carpenter, is 
essential for all. Upon this point I prefer to let Superin- 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1887 45 

tendent Harris, of Concord, Mass., perhaps the most philo- 
sophic mind engaged in public school work in this country, 
speak : — 

I do not think that the instruction of branches of manual training can be 
justified on the ground that they are of disciplinary value and especially devel- 
oping to the intellect, but if desirable at all their introduction must be defended 
on the ground of their general utility to the pupil as a future means of liveli- 
hood. 

As to the other claim setup by Superintendent Compton 
that "it (manual training) teaches no special trade and yet 
lays the foundation for any trade," it is very effectively 
disposed of by Dr. Harris in the following: — 

Special training in one branch of manipulation gives the muscles a set in 
one direction and unfits the workmen for other employments. The training 
of a blacksmith unfits him for a jeweler. The work of a carpenter unfits him 
far a lacemaker. In general, the trades that deal with the metals and wood 
unfit one for the manufacture of textile fabrics, for the latter requires delicacy 
of touch. 

And again : — 

To teach all the boys manual training — and " manual training " includes 
only some of the manipulations of woodwork and metal work, as it is taught in 
the specially so-called manual training schools — to teach all boys manual 
training is to teach twelve times as many as are required. 

This last quotation I have made to support the view 
that the simpler operations of woodwork and metal work 
embrace nearly all that the advocates of " manual train- 
ing " mean by the term. In another part of the article 
from which I have been quoting, Dr. Harris says, " The 
studies at present in the schools hold their place by reason 
of their general character." This I believe to be the true 
test : Is the study general or universal in character ? It 
may be general in one or other of two ways, or in both 



46 MANUAL TRAINING IN THE GRADES 

— of practical value in life or of disciplinary value. 
Arithmetic is a manifest exam pie of a study that is directly 
practical and indirectly disciplinary; and grammar of one 
that is directly disciplinary and indirectly practical. Now 
working in woods and metals cannot be regarded as uni- 
versal either from the practical or the disciplinary point of 
view. Therefore working in wood and metals should not 
be a part of the school curriculum which all should be 
obliged to study. 

On the other hand, I am disposed to think that sewing 
and cooking come within the category of things universal, 
and therefore might, perhaps ought, to be introduced in 
all our schools. There is no woman who does not upon 
occasion require to use the needle ; and a more widely 
diffused and scientific knowledge of the art of cooking 
would add enormously to the healthfulness and comfort of 
the people. The teaching of these arts might, I think, 
be introduced in all our schools without disturbing the 
equilibrium of the work or adding materially to the 
expense. 

It is the decay of the apprenticeship system that has led 
to this agitation for manual training. The agitation ex- 
presses what is really an urgent need — the need of special 
schools to teach trades. A school of this kind has been 
established in this city through the munificence of our 
fellow citizen, Charles Pratt, Esq., and it will doubtless be- 
come a most important adjunct to the public school system. 
As to the grammar and primary schools, it has been 
the policy of the Board to confine their work to studies 
universal in their application ; and I believe that this policy 
should be continued, at least until we know more about in- 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1887 47 

dustrial education than has yet been demonstrated by ex- 
periment. But even here manual training is not neglected. 
It is pursued in the only way that it has yet been dem- 
onstrated it can be pursued to be universal in its applica- 
tion — in connection with the work in drawing. This 
affords a discipline for the hand and eye, useful to all per- 
sons and under all circumstances. It is made the medium 
of expressing thought in "action," not merely by copying 
from models, but by the recombination of old forms in 
new and beautiful designs. 

If working in wood and metals with the tools employed 
in these crafts is to be introduced anywhere, it should be 
in connection with the scientific-mechanical course I have 
suggested for the Boys' Central School. As the students 
of this institution are permitted to elect their course of 
instruction, there is as good reason for allowing them to 
select scientific and mechanical work as there is for the 
languages or the commercial branches. 

There are some boys who do not take kindly to the ordi- 
nary work of the schools. From these the ranks of our tru- 
ants are largely recruited. As there is something abnormal 
in their character, so they require a peculiar training. For 
such boys the carpenter's bench would probably do much 
more than the arithmetic and the geography. How the 
training of these boys should be conducted must, however, 
be matter for future consideration. 

At present, this discussion must be largely theoretical. 
The attitude of Brooklyn will be conservative. When the 
experiments I have suggested shall have been successfully 
accomplished, it will then be time enough to consider any 
large scheme of manual training. 



48 MANUAL TRAINING IN THE GRADES 

SEWING AND COOKING 

(From the Brooklyn Report for i88g) 

During 1889, an attempt to establish Saturday sewing 
schools for girls was defeated by a small majority in the 
Board of Education. There is, however, a constantly 
growing sentiment in favor of making both cooking and 
sewing an integral part, as they certainly are a necessary 
part, of the education of girls. I have always been of the 
opinion that Saturday schools constitute the best means of 
teaching such branches. If, however, it be impracticable 
to establish such schools, I am satisfied that it would be 
better to take time from other studies, to teach sewing and 
cooking, than not to teach them at all. 

The argument for sewing and cooking is susceptible of 
brief statement. All school work should be a preparation 
for life. The destiny of the majority of girls is to be wives 
and mothers. No small part of their business in life is to 
manage households. In the conduct of the average house- 
hold, a knowledge of the arts of sewing and cooking is 
indispensable. When the mistress is wanting in the scien- 
tific knowledge of either sewing or cooking, her work is the 
merest drudgery. Whatever will elevate a necessary duty 
of life from a drudgery to an art, is a legitimate part of 
school work. Apart, moreover, from this practical side of 
the question is the culture side : conscious activity in pro- 
duction is as essential to true education as is the accumu- 
lation of knowledge. Sewing and cooking would provide 
a sphere that is now sadly lacking, for such conscious 
activity. 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1895 49 

SEWING 
(From the Brooklyn Report for i8g$) 

The Board of Estimate in 1895 appropriated $5000 for 
the introduction of the teaching of sewing during 1896. 
This sum has enabled the Board to secure the services of a 
Director of Sewing and four assistant teachers. With 
this force we have been enabled to introduce the work into 
about one third of the girls' classes in the grades from the 
Second Primary to the Fifth Grammar inclusive — from 
the beginning of the fourth to the close of the sixth year 
in school. The introduction has been accomplished with- 
out friction. The work promises to be both interesting and 
useful to the girls. 

Here again, as in the case of drawing, the aim should be 
to train the class teachers gradually to teach sewing as 
they teach other branches and to keep the number of 
special teachers at a minimum. 

As soon as it is possible, through an increased appropri- 
ation, to extend the teaching of sewing throughout the 
grades specified, an effort should be made to teach cooking 
to the girls of the higher grades. There is greater educa- 
tional value in cooking than in sewing ; and nothing taught 
in the schools is of greater practical worth. The general 
diffusion of a knowledge of scientific cooking would 
improve the health, the comfort, and the morals of the 
entire community. It is the best way to teach true 
" scientific temperance." 

Note. — It was not until 1902 that carpenter work for boys was introduced 
in the grades in Brooklyn. — The Editors. 



50 MANUAL TRAINING IN THE GRADES 

CHANGES IN MANUAL TRAINING COURSES RECOMMENDED 
{From the Greater New York Report for igoS- igog) 

The opposition on the part of conservative teachers and 
unthinking citizens to manual training in the grades has 
practically disappeared. The workshop for boys and the 
kitchen for girls have become integral parts of the elemen- 
tary school. Wherever there is a school without this equip- 
ment — and there are still many such schools — there is 
now a sustained agitation on the part not only of teachers 
but of parents to obtain it. The Board of Estimate and 
Apportionment has granted a considerable sum of money 
for next year to equip shops and kitchens in buildings not 
yet provided with them. This money will be available 
after January I, 19 10, for the purpose for which it has been 
appropriated, and it should be put to immediate use. 

The victory for manual training for girls was easily won, 
because sewing and cooking are practical arts which every 
girl should know. It was more difficult to persuade parents 
and municipal authorities that it was well worth while to 
spend money to teach every boy how to use his hands by 
means of the carpenter's tools. The old arguments — 
valid as they doubtless are — did not appeal to them. 
They laid little store by the considerations that a boy's eye 
must be trained to observe accurately, that his hand must 
acquire the habit of obeying the behests of the mind, and 
that working accurately on such a material as wood is 
admirable as ethical training, because no false or meretri- 
cious work can be done without immediate detection and 
because it generally brings its own punishment. Such ar- 
guments, which appealed with irresistible force to pro- 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1908-1909 51 

gressive educators, fell on deaf ears when addressed to the 
general public. But when it was shown that the carpen- 
ter's shop in an elementary school is necessary in order to 
discover mechanical talent so that the boy who has that 
precious endowment may be guided to the training and the 
work for which he is best adapted by nature ; and when it 
was shown further that the workshop provides the best 
possible preparation for vocational mechanical training — 
that it leads by easy and natural steps to the trade school — 
then the day was won for manual training in the grades. 

I make the following suggestions for increasing the 
efficiency and extending the usefulness of our manual train- 
ing courses : — 

1. Sewing and dressmaking should be taught to all girls 
throughout the seventh and eighth years, as well as 
throughout the first six years, and cooking should be taught 
in the sixth year and to all girls over twelve years of age in 
special classes, as well as throughout the last two years. 
At present the teaching of sewing stops at the close of the 
sixth year, except in schools in which kitchens are not pro- 
vided. Where kitchens are provided, cooking takes the 
place of sewing in the last two years of the course. The 
objections to this plan are : (1) that many of the girls who 
most need to know how to cook receive no instruction in the 
art because they leave before the close of the sixth year ; 
(2) that the skill which the girls acquire in sewing during 
the first six years is frequently lost by disuse during the last 
two ; and (3) that when the teaching of sewing ceases at the 
close of the sixth year it stops before its most useful appli- 
cations in the art of making garments are taught. 1 

1 This recommendation was put into effect in 1912. — The Editors. 



52 MANUAL TRAINING IN THE GRADES 

2. Sewing and cooking should be taught to all girls in 
high schools, no matter what course they are pursuing. 
The idea of the girl as a potential home maker should 
never be lost sight of during any part of her education. 

3. Our shops should be open to -all boys over twelve 
years of age during the afternoon and (for those who 
choose to come) on Saturday. For the sake of developing 
all his powers of mind and body, for the sake of discover- 
ing the boys who have a natural aptitude for mechanics 
and as a preparation for industrial work, all boys in the 
grades who are over twelve years of age should have this 
training. With our limited shop facilities it is not possible 
to give all such boys the opportunity between 9 a.m. and 
3 p.m. ; hence the necessity of using our shops in the 
afternoons and on Saturdays. The boys themselves will 
welcome the opportunity, as they look upon their efforts 
in the shop as recreation rather than work. 



VI 

THE CONTROVERSY OF 1904 

In 1904, Mr. Edward M. Grout, who then held the office of Comptroller, 
made a labored attack upon the city public school system on the ground of ex- 
travagance. " A large saving could be effected," he claimed, by " doing away 
in elementary schools with so much at least of instruction in special branches 
as may be required in order to afford pupils and teachers time and opportunity 
for efficient prosecution of the ordinary common school course of study." 
The " special branches " against which Mr. Grout directed his attack are : 
" elaborate courses of study in drawing, construction work, sewing or cook- 
ing, in physical training and hygiene, in music, and, during the first five years, 
in nature study." Dr. Maxwell prepared a report for the Special Committee 
of the Board of Education appointed to deal with the Comptroller's recom- 
mendations. The most significant parts of this report are printed below. 

— The Editors. 

{From the Report of February, igoj) 
NATURE STUDY 

i. r I A HE Comptroller includes, among the so-called 
X special branches, the elimination of which, in 
whole or in part, would cause a saving by doing away with 
" special teachers," a study in which no special teachers 
are employed; namely, nature study. Comment is unnec- 
essary. 

GERMAN AND FRENCH 

2. The Comptroller omits from the list of special branches 
two studies which give employment to a large number of 
special teachers, the German and French languages. The 

53 



54 THE CONTROVERSY OF 1904 

number of German teachers employed last year was sixty- 
two, at a cost in salaries of $85,186.68. The number of 
French teachers employed last year was ten, at a cost in 
salaries of $13,499.40. If to the item of salaries be added 
the cost of the textbooks from which these languages are 
taught, it will be found that the total expense for the year 
1903 was little short of $125,000, or more than the total 
cost for special teachers of sewing, cooking, and physical 
training, combined, which aggregated only $111,418.56. 
Why did the Comptroller omit the "special branches" of 
German and French? Does he regard the teaching of 
these languages as part of " what is ordinarily called a 
common school education"? In the judgment of your 
committee, in case of financial stress the teaching of these 
languages should be eliminated from the elementary course 
of study before any other special branch. It is more im- 
portant that our girls should grow up straight and strong 
and able to cook a meal and make their own clothes, and 
that our boys should be sturdy in body and equipped for 
skilled labor, than that .they should acquire an evanescent 
knowledge of a few French and German words and phrases. 
Your committee has refrained from recommending the 
immediate abolition of French and German teaching in 
the elementary schools only because of the representations 
of the City Superintendent, who argues with some show of 
reason that it is not wise in school administration to break 
too precipitately with the traditions of the past and that, 
in the case of children to whom English is not a foreign 
language, to learn the rudiments of a foreign tongue 
affords excellent mental training and furnishes a valuable 
mental equipment. 



REPORT OF FEBRUARY, 1904 55 

DRAWING AND HYGIENE 

3. Two "special branches" which the Comptroller 
would have us eliminate — drawing and hygiene — are 
required by the laws of the state to be taught in the public 
schools of the state. Chapter 332 of the Laws of 1875 
provides that industrial or freehand drawing shall be 
taught in such schools. Sections 19 and 20 of the Con- 
solidated School Law, as amended June 15, 1895, provide 
for the teaching of " the nature of alcoholic drinks and 
other narcotics and their effects on the human system " 
" in connection with the various divisions of physiology 
and hygiene " ; it even goes the length of defining the 
grades in which the subject shall be taught, the time to 
be devoted to it, and the character of the textbooks to be 
used. These subjects, therefore, cannot be eliminated. 

THE ARGUMENT FOR THE SPECIAL BRANCHES 

4. The other " special branches " which the Comptroller 
asks to eliminate either in whole or in part are physical 
training, cooking, singing, sewing, and manual training. A 
brief statement of the reasons why these subjects find a place 
in the curriculum and are taught in the schools will demon- 
strate the ignorance on which the request is founded : — ; 

(a) Physical Training. — It is the duty of all schools, 
and preeminently of public schools, to preserve and pro- 
mote the physical well-being of the pupils. If this duty 
is not attended to, close confinement in necessarily cramped 
postures while engaged in school work is dangerous in the 
highest degree to young children. The medical profession 
throughout the world are agreed that such confinement 



56 THE CONTROVERSY OF 1904 

almost necessarily results in weakness of the muscular 
system, in round shoulders and back, in poor circulation, 
in poor respiration, in poor digestion, in constipation, and 
in fatigue and restlessness. These defects, to which city 
children are peculiarly liable because of their restricted 
opportunities for free play and because of the confined 
area of most city dwellings, the school gymnastics are 
intended to correct. The time devoted to these exercises 
is fifteen minutes daily, in addition to a two-minute " set- 
ting up " exercise given at intervals three times a day. 
There are no books used in this work. The apparatus 
employed is secured as a part of the required equipment 
of each building. There are twenty-six special teachers 
of physical training. Of these, one gives his time to the 
ungraded classes and to examining children reported by 
their teachers as mentally defective ; another devotes his 
time to athletics; while twenty-four are engaged in show- 
ing the regular teachers how to conduct physical exercises. 
Moreover, the relief from sitting in constrained postures 
and the relaxation of. mind after a period of study, which 
are afforded by the quickening of the circulation and the 
extension of the muscles that result from the physical 
exercises, make them a vital part of the intellectual training. 
Their moral effect, too, is not unimportant. Physical 
exercises and athletic games (which have been widely in- 
troduced in the schools during the recess periods under 
the direction of the physical training teachers) are the 
best corrections of those morbid and vicious tendencies to 
which many children are prone, while they cure intel- 
lectual fatigue, diminish restlessness, afford a vent to sur- 
plus energy, that would otherwise expend itself in mischief, 



REPORT OF FEBRUARY, 1904 57 

and teach respect for authority by inculcating the habit of 
obedience to the word of command. What Herbert 
Spencer said on this subject is as true to-day as it was 
when written nearly forty years ago : — 

Those who, in eagerness to cultivate their pupils' minds, are reckless of 
their bodies, do not remember that success in the world depends much more 
upon energy than upon information; and that a policy which in cramming 
with information undermines energy, is self-defeating. The strong will and 
untiring activity which result from abundant animal vigor, go far to compensate 
even for great defects of education; and when joined with that quite adequate 
education which may be obtained without sacrificing health, they ensure an 
easy victory over competitors enfeebled by excessive study, prodigies of learn- 
ing though they may be. A comparatively small and ill-made engine, worked 
at high pressure, will do more than a larger and well-finished one worked at 
low pressure. What folly is it, then, while finishing the engine, so to damage 
the boiler that it will not generate steam? 

That the physical training exercises in the public schools 
are serving the purpose for which they are intended is 
shown by the following letter from Dr. Bremner, one of 
the examining physicians of the Board : — 

Hon. Wm. H. Maxwell: 

Dear Sir : It will interest you to know that nearly 95 per cent of the ap- 
plicants recently examined by me for the Training School were in excellent 
physical condition. I was especially impressed with the erect carriage of the 
candidates and, in many instances, with the unusually good chest expansion 
— evidences of the good results derived from the physical exercises. 

Very truly yours, 

(Signed) Samuel K. Bremner. 

Applicants for admission to the Training School are, with 
very few exceptions, graduates of both the high and ele- 
mentary schools. 

(b) Cooking. — Closely allied in its results to physical 
training and in its methods to manual training, is cooking. 
This art is taught to girls in the last two years of the ele- 



58 THE CONTROVERSY OF 1904 

* 

mentary course. It occupies the same time, in the case of 
girls, that is devoted to shop work in the case of boys. 
The training it affords in executive work is admirable, 
while it cultivates those homely virtues that form the 
foundation of the family and constitute the chief protec- 
tion of civilized society. The aim of the course is to make 
every girl a home maker — to know how to make the 
humblest home beautiful without waste and to prepare the 
plainest food in a way that shall be wholesome and appe- 
tizing without extravagance. There are twenty-seven 
teachers of cooking now employed. More teachers will 
be needed as kitchens are provided in the boroughs of 
Brooklyn, Queens, and Richmond, where this subject was 
not formerly taught. To discharge these teachers would 
not result in any saving, because, the last two years of the 
course being now for the most part organized on the de- 
partmental plan, it would be necessary to employ regular 
teachers in their places. The cost of material used in the 
cooking classes is $0,421 per year for each pupil. And 
yet, small as this cost Is, it is proving to be one of the most 
potent influences in preventing intemperance, in making 
girls womanly, and in raising the standard of living among 
our dense foreign population. If the standard of living in 
the tenements is to be raised from that of the poorest 
classes in Italy and Russia to the American standard — a 
consummation to be desired for the good of society in 
general and for the interests alike of labor and of capital 
— it will be done through the teaching of home making in 
the public schools. 

(V) Singing. — -There is not to-day, anywhere in the 
world, a school system worthy of the name that does not 



REPORT OF FEBRUARY, 1904 59 

include singing in its curriculum. By singing, the breath- 
ing organs are exercised and the chest developed, the voice 
is trained, and the ear cultivated. Singing music from 
notes trains the eye to quick perception and the mind to 
critical judgment. The rendering of songs evokes an in- 
telligent appreciation of the words, and leads to care in 
their enunciation, and cultivates the feelings. Singing in 
chorus tends to inculcate discipline of the best kind — 
that which is voluntary. It requires self-subordination, 
precision, attention, and concentration, and leads to self- 
reliance. Music, in a word, has a refining influence on 
all who are brought under its influence. In a school that 
has good music are almost certain to be found good disci- 
pline, good results in other studies, and an inspiring school 
spirit. These statements are elementary. Ever since the 
days of ancient Greece, music has formed part of the edu- 
cation of every highly civilized community. To abolish 
its teaching in the New York schools, or even to reduce 
the small amount of time now devoted to it, would be a dis- 
grace to our city. Perhaps, however, Comptroller Grout 
would not abolish it, but would simply discharge the 
special teachers of music. But experience has amply dem- 
onstrated that music cannot be successfully taught with- 
out the aid of specially trained music teachers. Without 
constant assistance the average class teacher has little power 
of teaching singing. When, however, the work is carefully 
outlined, explained, and demonstrated by the special teacher, 
the class teacher can then carry it on successfully in the 
daily lessons. In a school in which music is attempted 
without the aid of a skilled instructor, what do we find? 
A small number of trashy songs sung with hard, unmusical 



60 THE CONTROVERSY OF 1904 

voices, vicious tone production, shouting, singing out of 
tune, bad enunciation of words, and lack of interpretation 
either of the music or the sentiment : better no music than 
this. When the cost of teaching music in New York City 
is compared with similar expenditures in other cities that 
have attained a high reputation for their school music, it 
will be seen that it is most economically carried on here : — 

Boston ....... 22 cents per pupil 

Worcester ....... 19 cents per pupil 

Springfield . . .. . . . 19 cents per pupil 

Providence ...... 30 cents per pupil 

Utica . . . . . . . 17 cents per pupil 

Yonkers 25 cents per pupil 

New York . . . . . . 15 cents per pupil 

Under these circumstances, your committee cannot rec- 
ommend either the abolition of the teaching of music or a 
reduction in the corps of music teachers. Comptroller 
Grout made no opposition last summer to the spending of 
$48,663.50 for music in the parks to entertain the public : 
why does he begrudge $72,000 to teach six hundred thou- 
sand children to sing ? - 

(d) Sewing. — Every one concedes the value to girls 
of sewing ; to poor girls it is indispensable. Settlement 
workers bear witness to the improvement that has taken 
place in tenement-house homes as to the neatness, cleanli- 
ness, and comfort of clothing since an effort was put forth 
not only in the public schools, but by church and charitable 
organizations, to teach girls to sew, to darn, to patch, and 
to make their own garments. The work is taught by the 
regular teachers with the assistance of fifty-two special 
teachers. The time assigned is one hour per week. The 
total cost per pupil for material during the first three years 



REPORT OF FEBRUARY, 1904 6 1 

of training is only 44 J- cents ; in the last five years, only 
88^ cents. The educational value of sewing is that which 
attaches to any form of manual training. This will be 
considered under the next head. 

(e) Manual Training. — Used in its widest sense, the 
term includes drawing, modeling, sewing, cooking, con- 
structive work in cardboard or other material, and shop 
work practice or carpentry. In the restricted sense in 
which it is used in the course of study, however, it covers 
only drawing, constructive work, and shop work practice. 
The question as to whether manual training should con- 
tinue in the schools really resolves itself into the question, 
Should the arts be taught in the schools ? The science 
of education answers this question in the affirmative be- 
cause the arts constitute one of the most important parts 
of the intellectual inheritance of the race ; and any part 
of this inheritance which the child can understand is 
appropriate and even necessary subject matter for the 
schools. But there are more practical reasons which may 
be considered from the physiological, the educational, and 
the economic points of view. 

Physiology teaches us that the nervous system has two 
great divisions — the in-carrying nerves, that carry im- 
pressions from the outside world to the brain and spinal 
cord, and the motor nerves, which carry impulses from 
the brain to the organs of action. The nerve cells of 
motor areas grow only through exercise. If they are not 
exercised, they do not grow. Without such growth there 
is arrest of the mental development that comes from motor 
expression. A man trained only through book learning 
is, therefore, only half trained. From the educational 



62 THE CONTROVERSY OF 1904 

point of view, psychology shows us that two of the child's 
primary instincts are to construct and to decorate. Instruc- 
tion in the arts builds upon these instincts. Constructive 
agencies are the natural means through which the child 
grows by self-expression. Moreover, this instruction affords 
the rest that comes from change of occupation in school. 

In the second place, manual training is an important 
element in the development of character. It develops 
habits of cleanliness, order, system, and perseverance. 
It holds up as ideals self-reliance, honesty of work, and 
respect for skilled labor. 

In the third place, as the things with which the child 
comes in contact are for the most part the product of the 
arts, this school work gives him an insight into the pro- 
cesses by which man has developed his civilization. It 
tends to cultivate the child as a social being. 

In the fourth place, it cultivates the sense of beauty — 
the power to appreciate what is beautiful and the power 
to make beautiful things. 

In the fifth place, this work reveals the child to himself; 
it tells him whether or not he has latent talent for the 
arts. If he has such talent, he will naturally seek to 
cultivate it and thus improve himself and add to the 
wealth of the country ; if he has not such talent, he will 
seek some other form of occupation. Instruction in the 
arts tends directly, therefore, to diminish that most prolific 
source of economic waste — the setting of men to work for 
which they are not naturally fitted. 

The last sentence naturally leads to the economic rea- 
sons for instruction in the arts. These may be briefly 
stated thus : The economic success of our country, the 



REPORT OF FEBRUARY, 1904 63 

continued prosperity of our city, depend very largely on 
our skilled workmen. The teaching of the arts lays the 
foundation for the development of skill, points out those 
whose constructive talents should be specially trained, and 
thus aids in economic development. To give an education 
in the schools that trains only for clerical work is as great 
a mistake from the economic as it is from the educational 
point of view. 

On an average three hours a week, or one eighth of the 
total time, is devoted to manual training. Most educa- 
tional authorities are now agreed, however, that from 
one fifth to one fourth of a pupil's time should be devoted 
to the training of his motor as distinguished from his 
sensory nature. 

This whole subject of manual training is so important, 
and so interesting that your committee presents at the 
close of this report the opinions of many of the leading 
educational authorities of the country which amply support 
your committee's position. 

Such are the arguments in favor of the retention of the 
so-called special branches. It is preposterous to assert 
that they interfere with instruction in what have been 
called the ordinary public school studies. On the contrary, 
the alternation of work requiring expression with work 
involving only the reception of knowledge has led to a 
vast improvement in the results from these studies. Our 
children read more and read better, have a more rational 
knowledge of history and geography, and an incomparably 
greater power of expression than they had twenty years 
ago. The purely memoriter or rote method of learning 
has given way to rational methods of teaching. 



64 THE CONTROVERSY OF 1904 

The elementary course of study in the city has not been 
for twenty years the course to which Comptroller Grout 
would now have us return. The reform that has slowly 
but surely developed in New York City is but part of a 
movement that has affected the entire public school system 
of the country. What the results of public education were 
under the course before this wave of reform set in, to 
which Mr. Grout would now have us return, is well stated 
by Professor Hanus, of Harvard, in his " Educational 
Aims and Educational Values," as follows : — 

It was, therefore, quite generally true that the total permanent result of 
the first eight or nine years of the pupil's school life was the ability to read, 
but not the reading habit ; the ability to spell and write words, but no power 
of expression with the pen ; a varying ability to add, subtract, multiply, and 
divide simple numbers, integral and fractional, but much uncertainty in all 
other arithmetical operations ; some fragmentary book knowledge of names 
and places of our own country and of foreign countries ; and some scrappy 
information relating to the history of the United States. 

Most pupils have derived few permanent interests from these first eight or 
nine years of school life, and those who left school without entering the high 
school very naturally regarded what they had learned of intellectual pursuits 
as typical of intellectual interests in general, and felt for them little respect 
and less regard. Inasmuch as the great majority of the community is com- 
posed of those who have not continued their school life beyond the grammar 
school, it is evident that, for the great majority of the community, -education 
had been only an incident, and not, as it should be, a great leavening in- 
tellectual, moral, and social force. 

Such is the course of study to which the Comptroller 
would have us return. His position is analogous to that 
of the anti-vaccinationist toward the practice of vaccination 
now universally accepted by medical authorities. In a 
precisely similar manner he opposes his views to the gen- 
erally accepted theory and practice of the highest educa- 
tional authorities. Were there anywhere in the world 
schools in which it was not thought desirable to make 



REPORT OF FEBRUARY, 1904 65 

learning pleasurable, to cultivate the creative powers, to 
promote physical health and strength, and to make educa- 
tion a preparation for practical life, in such schools Comp- 
troller Grout's views on education would carry weight. 
They carry no weight in New York. 



VII 
MANUAL TRAINING HIGH SCHOOLS 

In 1890, Dr. Maxwell started the movement for the establishment of a 
manual training high school in Brooklyn. As will be seen from the follow- 
ing extracts from his annual reports it took some years to convince the educa- 
tional and financial authorities of the city that his project was wise. The 
movement resulted in the establishment, in 1894, of the Manual Training 
High School of Brooklyn — the first school of the kind in Greater New York — 
after which several other schools have been modeled. — The Editors. 

{From the Brooklyn Report for i8go) 

IT is sufficiently evident that very soon the present high 
schools, even with the increased accommodations that 
are now in course of construction, will not be able to accom- 
modate all of the pupils that will seek admission. The 
number of pupils graduating during the present year from 
the grammar schools will be at least 1800, and will prob- 
ably be nearer 2000. If three fourths of those graduating 
in June seek admission, it will not be possible to receive 
them. What is to be done? The solution of the difficulty 
is to take one of our old buildings and transform it into a 
manual training school. The cost for the first year need 
not exceed $10,000. Many pupils will go to such a school 
who would not go to one of the literary high schools, be- 
cause the work will better suit their special needs. 

In such a school, two hours a day would be devoted to 
book work, one hour a day to industrial drawing, and two 

66 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1890 67 

hours a day to laboratory or shop work properly correlated 
with drawing and book work. 

For girls there should be instruction in sewing, cooking, 
stenography and typewriting, and wood carving. For boys 
there should be instruction in the use of the principal tools 
employed in wood and metal work, and in the various 
branches of electricity. 

Both sexes would come together in the classes for book 
work, which would embrace four hours a week at English, 
three hours a week at mathematics, and three hours a week 
at physics and chemistry. 

The argument that the public schools should not teach 
these subjects, no longer holds good. We are already 
teaching Latin, Greek, and modern languages. If we are 
justified in teaching such subjects, surely we are justified 
in teaching others that lie so much nearer to the necessities 
of everyday life. 

Nor would such a school be an experiment. The scheme 
has been fully tried in other places and has been found 
abundantly successful. In Philadelphia, in Baltimore, in 
Washington, in Chicago, in Toledo, in St. Louis, in Min- 
neapolis, in St. Paul, and in many other places, manual 
training schools have been established, and everywhere 
with very great success, with profound satisfaction to the 
community, and with manifest benefit to the rising 
generation. 

Such a school would not teach trades. It would, how- 
ever, teach the principles that underlie all manual trades. 
It is to be defended on the ground that these principles 
and the processes in which they are embodied, furnish, 
when properly correlated with drawing and book work, an 



68 MANUAL TRAINING HIGH SCHOOLS 

instrument of education not second to any literary educa- 
tion whatever. 

The time is ripe for such a school. The pupils are 
ready to enter. The building can be obtained. The ex- 
pense will be small ; the benefits incalculable. 

{From the Brooklyn Report for i8gi) 

During the spring term last year your Board very wisely, 
in my judgment, adopted resolutions providing for the 
establishment of a manual training school, but the failure 
of the Board of Estimate to appropriate the necessary 
funds prevented the realization of the scheme. 

In advocacy of the proposed plan the Committee on 
Manual Training prepared a pamphlet setting forth the 
arguments in its favor. To this pamphlet all who have 
any doubts either of the wisdom or of the expediency of 
establishing a manual training school, are respectfully 
referred. But, really, such a proposition no longer needs 
supporting arguments. Manual training, as it has been de- 
veloped in the high schools of Philadelphia, Baltimore, 
Toledo, Chicago, St. Paul, and other cities, has long since 
passed beyond the period of experiment. It must be ac- 
cepted as a great and beneficent addition to the forces of 
education and civilization. 

I have yet <o be convinced that, for children under four- 
teen years of age, any successful system of manual train- 
ing, except the gifts and games of the kindergarten and 
" form study and drawing " as it is found to-day in our 
schools, has been worked out. But, for children of four- 
teen — the age at which a boy's arm may be supposed to be 
strong enough to use a hammer and a saw — the problem 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1891 69 

has been most satisfactorily solved. For five or six years 
the cities I have mentioned have been separately engaged 
in working out courses of study that properly coordinate 
book work, laboratory work, drawing, and shop work. The 
results arrived at are virtually identical. This fact is in 
itself sufficient evidence that something exceedingly definite 
and reasonably permanent has been reached. 

If such a school were established in the building, corner 
Court and Livingston streets, when it is vacated by the 
Boys' High School, the annual expense of maintenance, be- 
yond rental and cost of plant, would probably not exceed 
$15,000 per annum. The cost of the necessary plant 
would probably not exceed $10,000, and only a part of this 
amount would be needed at first. 

The only argument that has been urged with even a 
show of plausibility against this scheme is that, while 
primary children have insufficient accommodation, no 
more money should be expended on what is called higher 
education — secondary education would be a more ap- 
propriate term. Upon this argument I have to remark, 
in the first place, that if, as has been repeatedly pointed 
out, existing accommodations were utilized to the best ad- 
vantage, they would very much more nearly meet the re- 
quirements of the city than they do at present. In the 
second place, if the children under six years of age were 
either excluded from our schools, in which they have no 
business, or if they were placed in kindergarten classes, the 
pressure in the primary grades would be very much re- 
lieved. Under six years of age, it is, in my judgment, an 
act of cruelty, if not a crime, to subject a child to the close 
confinement and the severe drill involved in the regular 



70 MANUAL TRAINING HIGH SCHOOLS 

grade work of a public school. For a child to wait until it 
is six years of age, or even seven, before entering on our 
primary work involves neither loss nor hardship. For a 
boy of fourteen not to be able to find the instruction he re- 
quires, involves incalculable loss to himself and loss to the 
community. If we were obliged to choose — though this 
is by no means necessary — between teaching the alphabet 
to infants of five and teaching boys of fourteen how to use 
their brains in directing their hands, on every consideration 
of the greatest good for the individual and the greatest 
good for the greatest number, we should adopt the latter 
course. In the third place, if we should wait, before estab- 
lishing a manual training school, until there will be no dis- 
trict in the city without adequate primary accommodations, 
we should have to wait until the last vacant lot within the 
city limits shall have been built upon. As long as there are 
large areas of vacant territory in different parts of the city 
into which the speculative builder makes his incursions ; 
as long as population, following the march of rapid 
transit, makes a rush now in one direction now in another, — 
so long will there be districts in which the school popula- 
tion will exceed the school accommodations. If schools 
could spring up, like Jonah's gourd, in a night, we might 
keep pace with the rapid migrations of population ; but 
while it takes from a year to a year and a half to build a 
schoolhouse, we cannot hope to do so. To argue that we 
should have no manual training until an impossible condi- 
tion is realized, is not a fair argument. 

The movement for manual training is the protest of the 
people against the hide-bound conservatism of the schools; 
it is the demand for what will be of practical value as opposed 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1892 7 1 

to what is merely or largely ideal ; it is the cry of thinking 
men and women to schoolmasters and school boards: 
Stop the memorizing of useless details and teach our chil- 
dren to form habits of industry ; train their minds to plan 
and their hands to execute. 

A manual training school may be operated at an annual 
expense not greater than that which it now costs to teach 
Latin and Greek in the high schools. 

(From the Brooklyn Report for i8g2) 

It has been stated that our new high school build- 
ings are already full and that additional high school ac- 
commodation is urgently needed at once. In the case of 
boys, this may be provided at a very slight expense by es- 
tablishing a manual training school in the now unused build- 
ing on Bedford Avenue, corner of Jefferson. The sum of 
$25,000 will fit this building with the necessary furniture 
and apparatus and pay the salaries of the teachers for a 
year. 

It is unnecessary to reiterate the arguments advanced in 
my former reports and fully set forth in the report presented 
to your Board a year ago by the Committee on Manual 
Training, in favor of a manual training school. Three 
times your Board has decided that such a school ought to 
be established, and three times the Board of Estimate has 
refused to grant the money necessary for its establishment. 
The conditions, however, are now such, the demand for in- 
creased high school accommodation being so urgent, that 
there seems to be no other alternative. In my judgment, no 
more money should be spent for high school buildings for 
boys desiring a purely literary or commercial education, until 



72 MANUAL TRAINING HIGH SCHOOLS 

some provision has been made for the training of those who 
propose to make their living by the skilled use of their hands 
and eyes. While, perhaps, not all has been done that may 
be done for those who intend to be clerks and merchants 
and professional men, nothing more should be done until 
those of the other class, who have hitherto been almost 
wholly neglected in our scheme of education, shall have 
been provided with a means of training suited to their needs. 

It should not be supposed, however, that a manual train- 
ing school would be for the purpose of teaching specific 
trades. Such a purpose would be wholly aside from the 
object of public education 1 and from the object directly in 
view in establishing a manual training school. That object 
is, not to teach trades, but to teach the universal principles 
— mechanical, scientific, and artistic — which underlie and 
condition all the mechanic arts, and to impart that accuracy 
to the eye and that skill to the hand which the successful 
prosecution of any of the arts requires. 

The literary high school, as it is found in Brooklyn and 
all other American cities, represents a type of school 
suited to conditions that prevailed universally in a remote 
antiquity, and that prevail, though in a greatly lessened 
degree, up to the present time. The manual training school 
is a type evolved directly from modern industrial society. 
A community that does not provide manual training for its 
children is bound to fail in competition with communities 
that make such provision. 

The industrial pursuits of the people, not less than the 

1 As will be seen later, Dr. Maxwell's views as to the propriety of teaching 
trades in the public schools have been materially modified since this sentence 
was written. — The Editors. 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1893 73 

wealth or the poverty, the social tone, or the political status 
of society, constitute the environment of the school system. 
A school system, to subserve the ends for which it is estab- 
lished, must adapt itself to its environment. 

(Fro??i the Brooklyn Report for 1893) 

In 1893, for the first time, the words " manual training " 
were used in the by-laws of the Board of Education. A 
by-law was adopted authorizing the appointment of a 
standing committee of seven members on manual training. 
This committee was authorized to organize a manual train- 
ing school in the building, corner of Court and Livingston 
streets, formerly occupied, successively, by the Central 
Grammar School and the Boys' High School. Mr. Felix 
Campbell has kindly given the use of the building rent- 
free for one year. He did the same some years ago when 
the Central Grammar School, out of which our whole high 
school system has grown, was organized. To this gentle- 
man's beneficent public spirit, therefore, must in no small 
degree be attributed the introduction of manual training 
into the public school system, as well as the organization 
of high schools. 

The establishment of a manual training school was 
secured only after an agitation that lasted some years, and 
after persistent effort to secure requisite legislation from 
your Board and afterwards to secure a small appropriation 
from the Board of Estimate. In all this work Mr. Peter 
H. McNulty took a leading part and rightfully became the 
first chairman of the Committee on Manual Training. 

I must needs regard the step thus taken as one of 
momentous importance not only to the school system, but 



74 MANUAL TRAINING HIGH SCHOOLS 

to the city of Brooklyn. It brings us more into line with 
the progressive educational thought of the times. It brings 
the schools more into touch with the spirit of the age, 
which is nothing if not practical. 

The school itself was organized in February, 1894, with 
Mr. Charles D. Larkins, as principal, a corps of efficient 
teachers, and about 150 students. Should the school re- 
ceive an accession of students each term equal to the first, 
it will soon be too large for its present quarters. 

Boys alone are admitted to the school. In my judg- 
ment, this limitation is a mistake. This school is now the 
only part of our system in which girls are not accorded 
exactly the same advantages as boys. Girls should have 
the same opportunities with regard to manual training that 
they have with regard to other studies. 

The small amount — only $10,000 — granted by the 
Board of Estimate for manual training was consumed in 
providing the necessary workbenches, machinery, tools, 
and apparatus, required for the first half year's work and 
in making some necessary repairs to the building. As a 
second set of pupils will enter in September, further ex- 
penditures for apparatus are needed without delay. 

{From the Greater New York Report for iSgS—iSgg) 

There is but one manual training high school — that of 
Brooklyn — in the city. Manhattan and The Bronx should 
have two or three such schools, Brooklyn needs at least 
one more, and, as I have already pointed out, each new 
high school building in Queens and Richmond should be 
equipped with a manual training department. 

The time has gone by when it w T as supposed that the 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1898-1899 75 

aim of a manual training high school is to make carpenters 
and blacksmiths out of its pupils. It is now realized that 
the manual training high school in teaching the use of 
tools, without aiming at making craftsmen, and in teach- 
ing the practical application of science and art to industry, 
forms the best preparation for life in the case of those who 
have a mechanical turn of mind and who intend to devote 
themselves to any kind of manufacturing industry. Ex- 
perience has also demonstrated that the keenness of obser- 
vation, deftness of hand, and mental ingenuity developed 
by the work of the manual training high school constitute 
the best possible preparation for entrance to a medical 
school or one of the great scientific schools, such as the 
School of Applied Science in Columbia or the Institute of 
Technology in Boston. 

The manufacturing interests of the country and of our 
own city are increasing with marvelous rapidity. We are 
building railroad bridges in the Soudan and selling our 
hardware in all the markets of Europe. The opportunities 
for a boy who understands mechanics, who can devise with 
his brain, and execute with his hands, are constantly de- 
veloping. Our boys, if they have the requisite training, 
will seize the opportunities. The city of New York can- 
not afford to neglect the mechanical education of her sons. 
I do not undervalue the work of the literary high school. 
Though of recent growth in New York as a part of the 
public school system, it has an honorable lineage that ex- 
tends back through centuries. But the literary high school 
does not supply all that is needed in the expanding activi- 
ties of modern life. The practical demand of the day is 
not only for young men and young women who have had 



76 MANUAL TRAINING HIGH SCHOOLS 

the training and culture of the humanities, but for those 
who have been trained in the activities that form the 
material basis of modern civilization. Moreover, the ex- 
perience of the manual training high school shows that 
school training for mechanical and commercial pursuits is 
in no way inconsistent with culture of a high order. 



VIII 
COMMERCIAL EDUCATION 

An address delivered by Dr. Maxwell before the Chamber of Commerce of 
New York and the recommendations contained in his Annual Report for 
1898-1899 led directly to the establishment of the High School of Commerce 
in the Borough of Manhattan — the first high school in America devoted 
exclusively to commercial education. — The Editors. 

{From the Greater New York Report for i8g8-i8gg) 

Or^HE city of New York is a great manufacturing center, 
JL but it is still greater as a commercial center ; it is 
the commercial metropolis of America, It would seem 
obvious, therefore, that great attention should be paid in 
its public schools to commercial education. Yet such is not 
the case. The commercial courses, for instance, in the 
Brooklyn high schools are only half the length of the 
literary courses, and to the commercial courses gravitate 
the pupils of smallest intellectual attainments. 

In the old city of New York practically nothing was 
done, outside of the elementary course, for commercial 
education. Nor were the public school authorities of the 
past altogether to blame in this matter. The merchants 
and manufacturers of the city have done little or nothing to 
demand a high standard of education in the boys and girls 
entering their service from the schools. An extensive in- 

77 



78 COMMERCIAL EDUCATION 

quiry has satisfied me that they have not even been careful 
to see, before engaging them to work, that their employees 
had completed the elementary school course. 

There are signs, however, that our great employers of 
labor are beginning to see the mistake they have made. 
The Chamber of Commerce has taken up the matter with 
enthusiasm and will no doubt cooperate with the school 
boards to secure the successful establishment of commer- 
cial high schools. In an address delivered before that 
body on November 3, 1898, I used the following language, 
which I take the liberty of transferring to these pages : — 

The two-year commercial courses in the Brooklyn high schools should be 
abolished, and probably the four-year courses in the Manhattan high schools 
recently established. A commercial high school should be established in 
Manhattan, and a commercial high school should be established in Brooklyn. 
My experience with the work of the two-year commercial courses in the 
Brooklyn high schools leads me reluctantly to the conclusion that they are not 
nearly as effective as they should be. They are established in schools in 
which the largest share of attention is given to the classical and scientific 
courses. These courses attract the more gifted pupils and the stronger teach- 
ers. All the more poorly equipped pupils gravitate to the commercial 
courses. It will be interesting to observe the development of the four-year 
commercial courses in the Manhattan high schools. However they may 
succeed, I am quite sure that two-year commercial courses placed side by 
side with four-year literary and scientific courses are simply a colossal blunder. 
Indeed, such a course was abolished fifteen years ago in the College of the 
City of New York, because it proved an utter failure. 

What we need are commercial high schools that shall be wholly devoted 
to preparation for commercial work. The work of these schools should be 
based on mercantile experience, and should meet the demands of the time. 
Not only should commercial arithmetic and bookkeeping, banking, and mod- 
ern languages be taught, but such subjects as international commerce, the 
work of the Produce and other Exchanges, the regulation of systems of 
weights and measures throughout the civilized world, methods of determining 
quality in grain, yarn, silk, and other staple and commercial articles; the sys- 
tems of money used in different countries, and systems of exchange; the trans- 
portation of goods, railroad fares, and freight rates, ocean transportation of 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1898-1899 79 

freight, price quotations, the explanation of the settlement of balances by ex- 
port and import, a knowledge of merchandise based on the study of natural 
sciences and determined by instruments of precision, such as the microscope 
and polariscope; insurance in all of its ramifications; political economy, 
commercial law, and all other matters which it concerns a merchant in these 
modern days to know. 

The immense progress made by the natural sciences, technology, and 
transportation in recent years, has given to the commercial profession con- 
stantly increasing importance, and rendered it a much more potent civilizing 
force than in former years; for the work of this profession men specially 
educated are needed. If the United States are to take the place that their 
population and their resources demand, in international commerce, men must 
be trained for commercial work as they are trained for the professions of law 
and medicine. 

The most effective method by which the Chamber of 
Commerce could strengthen the hands of the educational 
authorities would be by influencing the merchants of this 
city to give the preference, when hiring employees, to the 
graduates of the commercial high schools when they are 
established. It is such favorable action on the part of em- 
ployers of labor that has insured the success of the com- 
mercial schools that now flourish in all the large cities of 
western Europe, of which the great school at Leipzig may 
be taken as a type. And it is these schools that are send- 
ing forth the young men, trained to speak and write two 
or three modern languages and skilled in all the technical- 
ities of commerce, who are competing successfully for the 
more lucrative positions in the great mercantile establish- 
ments of London as well as New York. 

The city of New York has the means, if her educational 
authorities have the wisdom, to establish commercial high 
schools that will do as much for America as the German 
commercial high schools have done for Germany. 



80 COMMERCIAL EDUCATION 

PROGRESS OF COMMERCIAL EDUCATION 

The address which follows was delivered by Dr. Maxwell before the New 
York Chamber of Commerce in March, 191 2. It shows the progress made in 
commercial education during the years that had elapsed since the founding of 
the High School of Commerce; and also discloses Dr. Maxwell's attitude 
toward the agitation to provide elective trade and commercial courses during 
the last two years of the elementary school. — The Editors. 

{From the Monthly Bulletin, Chamber of Commerce, March, 1912) 

Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Chamber. — 
I am highly honored and deeply gratified in again being 
permitted after a lapse of thirteen years, to address the 
Chamber of Commerce. When I spoke to you on that 
occasion I had something very definite to say, because then 
I had in mind the founding of what was, and is, the first 
High School of Commerce in North America. Immedi- 
ately after that address the matter was taken up by the 
then Board of Education, and pushed to a conclusion, with 
the result that we have a high school of commerce in the 
Borough of Manhattan, Sixty-fifth Street, west of Broad- 
way, which has taken^ the High School of Leipzig very 
largely as its model ; and the equally great High School of 
Commerce in the Borough of Brooklyn. I am very much 
obliged to my friend, Mr. Thompson, from Boston, who 
has acknowledged the indebtedness of Boston to New 
York. I well remember that visit of a committee of the 
Chamber of Commerce, Mayor Fitzgerald, and the entire 
School Committee of Boston, who came to look over this 
new thing we had established in New York. I recall par- 
ticularly one little incident that occurred that has always 
been deeply gratifying to me. They were very welcome 
to the plan of the school, very welcome to all the sug- 



ADDRESS, CHAMBER OF COMMERCE, 1912 8l 

gestions they could find in its administration, but they 
threatened to do something that we would not have 
welcomed, and that was to take one of our most dis- 
tinguished teachers to act as principal in the proposed 
school in Boston. I have always been deeply gratified 
that they did not take from us Dr. Sullivan, who is now 
the principal of the Boys' High School in Brooklyn. 

I said at that time when I stood before you, thirteen 
years ago, that I had a definite plan in mind, which I 
have been very happy to see realized. I regret that I 
cannot speak with any definiteness, to-day, as to what may 
be done for commercial education more than is done in 
the elementary schools. That plan has not been worked 
out in my mind, nor, as far as I know, in the mind of any 
one else. I wish I could tell you just what we need — 
first, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, as Dr. Brown has 
done for New York University ; but that I cannot do, 
because, for one reason, you have not told us just what 
you want to have a boy who leaves the elementary schools 
at fourteen or fourteen and a half years of age know. 
Fourteen years and a half is the average age of graduation 
after completing the course in the elementary schools. 
No one, as far as I know, has ever formulated just what is 
the most that is reasonable to expect from a boy fourteen 
or fourteen and a half years old. There are, however, two 
or three things that I may tell you which you should not 
expect. You should not expect a boy fourteen years old 
to conduct a difficult correspondence with a business man 
with whom you are dealing, and you should not expect 
him to meet other business men and talk to them as you 
would, or as your clerks of long experience would. In my 



82 COMMERCIAL EDUCATION 

judgment a great deal too much is expected from a boy or 
a girl fourteen or fourteen and a half years of age ; and 
that is why we established a High School of Commerce, in 
order that they might have the added training that comes 
after the elementary school course. 

I am not going to tell you what we do in the High 
School of Commerce, because its distinguished principal, 
Mr. Sheppard is the next speaker ; but there is some talk, 
at present, of quite a revolutionary change in the last two 
years of the course in the elementary schools. It has been 
proposed by some leading thinkers and administrators of 
educational work that, instead of the time-honored curric- 
ulum, which teaches the boy and the girl in the last two 
years of the course the history and civics of the country, 
something of English literature, a good deal of arithmetic, a 
little science, and some drawing — that curriculum which 
has come down to us through the ages, and which has 
done great things for this world, — great things, gentle- 
men, — it has been proposed that we should establish three 
elective courses at the „end of the sixth year, and permit 
each boy and girl to select his own course. One would 
be the course pretty much as it is at present, leading to 
high school, then on to college or the professional schools. 
Another would be a trade course for boys and girls between 
twelve and fourteen years of age, in which the rudiments 
of trades should be taught, possibly with a view of short- 
ening the term of apprenticeship. The third elective 
course would be a course in business training, for commer- 
cial work, for boys and girls of the average age of twelve 
and a half to fourteen and a half years. 

Now, I am not going to say to you, to-day, that this is pos- 



ADDRESS, CHAMBER OF COMMERCE, 191 2 83 

sible ; neither am I going to say that it is impossible. I shall, 
however, lay before you two or three considerations that 
will show you the great difficulty of realizing in actual 
school administration a scheme of this kind. The first is 
the difficulty of securing properly trained special teachers. 
Now, perhaps I am wrong in saying that, considering the fact 
that I understand that Chancellor Brown is ready, if you 
will give him $200,000, to furnish all the trained teachers 
we may need ; but I am somewhat in doubt still. This 
matter of obtaining competent teachers is very difficult and 
very expensive ; but the first thing to be done before you 
make any division of that kind, gentlemen, is to secure 
the trained teacher to put into the elementary schools, to 
teach subjects that the present teachers are not able to teach. 
To fail to do that is to kill the whole thing in the beginning. 
It would be money and time wasted. You must have your 
trained teachers. 

In the second place, it will require, particularly for the 
trades, a very expensive equipment. We have established 
two trade schools for boys and girls who cannot complete 
the elementary school course. The boys and girls that go 
to those schools are practically a few of the failures at 
their books, who are now successfully learning trades; but 
the equipment of those schools, particularly that for the 
boys' school in which we teach carpentry, pattern making, 
plumbing, blacksmithing, electrical wiring, printing, and 
some other trades, that do not come to my mind at the 
moment, is tremendously expensive. If it is decided that 
every boy in the city who reaches the age of twelve and a 
half should have a chance to take such a course, then the 
Chamber of Commerce has got to " get busy " with the Board 



84 COMMERCIAL EDUCATION 

of Estimate and Apportionment to obtain money to equip 
and build more schools. 

The last and the third consideration is, to my mind, the 
most difficult and important of all. To carry out a propo- 
sal of this kind implies that you are going to ask boys 
and girls between twelve and thirteen years of age to make 
up their minds as to just what course of life they are going 
to pursue for the rest of the years that they remain on this 
earth. Now, that is a pretty hard thing. Something like 
fifty years ago President Eliot, of Harvard, was the pio- 
neer in introducing the elective system in Harvard Uni- 
versity. He argued strongly and convincingly that teachers 
in the university would teach very much better when they 
had only those students who were interested in their par- 
ticular subjects, and that the students would do much better 
and harder work if they were permitted to select only those 
subjects that they cared to study. While I have no doubt 
that great good has come out of that elective system, there 
is now a reaction against it. The smaller colleges of this 
country, and I think rightly, never entirely copied Harvard's 
plan, and in the large universities — and in Harvard itself 
to-day — there is a strong reaction against the elective 
system. And why ? Because it has been found that the 
average young man, from eighteen to twenty-two years of 
age, is not mature enough, is not wise enough, to select just 
what he ought to study ; and yet we are told that children be- 
tween twelve and thirteen years of age ought to select the 
course of education that will mold their future life. Now, 
that may be possible ; but I do not see my way yet to 
recommend it to the New York City Board of Education. 
I want, just here, to call your attention to a most interest- 



ADDRESS, CHAMBER OF COMMERCE, 191 2 85 

ing and extraordinary experiment that has been tried dur- 
ing the past year under the direction of my friend Herr 
Kerschensteiner, of Munich. A careful study, largely 
made by physicians with the aid of teachers, has been 
carried on there, and every one of the pupils in the Munich 
public schools who, this year, completed the course, has 
received a very definite diagnosis of his character, abilities, 
and tastes, and very definite advice as to the kind of 
schools in which he should pursue his future studies. 

Now, that leads me to say this : There is in my judg- 
ment, in the administration of our city, a tremendous anom- 
aly. A vast amount of money is expended for which we 
are not getting the best results, because of the form of 
administration. The physicians who inspect our schools 
are under the absolute direction of the Board of Health. 
They make, I think, rather perfunctory examinations, a 
couple of hours a day, or an hour a day, and then go away 
again. As a matter of fact, one half of the children in our 
city schools are not examined medically every year. That 
work, in my judgment, will not be properly done, and such 
work, wonderful work, as has been done in Munich during 
this last year, will not be possible in the city of New York, 
until the medical inspection is transferred from the juris- 
diction of the Board of Health to the jurisdiction of the 
Board of Education. When that is done we shall have 
the assistance of these physicians in trying to determine 
the character of the work which each boy is best fitted to 
pursue, and in trying to advise the boy and the girl as to 
the course of their future education. 

In this connection, too, I should like to throw out another 
thought. The only continuation schools that we have are 



86 COMMERCIAL EDUCATION 

our evening schools. Those schools, in my judgment, have 
done a great work in this city, particularly our evening high 
schools, and our classes, which are very large, in which 
English is taught to foreigners. You would be surprised 
if you went into one of these schools to see, particularly 
last summer — we tried the experiment during last July and 
August, and you will remember how hot the weather was 
— you would be surprised to see foreigners from twenty 
to fifty years of age, in their shirt sleeves on those hot summer 
nights, working in dead earnest to learn to read and write 
the English language. You would have said, "Those schools 
are doing good work, and we ought to have more of them." 
For the boy or girl who leaves school just as soon as he 
can, as soon as the law will permit him, and generally long 
before the elementary school course is over, and is sent to 
work, the only school is the evening school. Now, this 
boy of fourteen to sixteen years, who leaves school without 
completing the elementary school course, does not get a 
nice job in the office of one of you gentlemen. He looks 
around, and, with the aid of his parents or friends, takes 
the first job that comes along, maybe as a messenger boy, 
maybe riding on the tail end of a delivery wagon, any 
opening you please. The law requires him to go to school 
in the evening. He gets out of it whenever he can, and I 
don't blame him, because he has worked hard for ten or 
twelve hours all day, and when the evening comes it is 
time for recreation or sleep and not for study. Now, one 
of the first great things needed in my judgment in this 
city is a series of continuation schools for these boys and 
girls who have left the elementary schools without com- 
pleting the course. These continuation schools should be 



ADDRESS, CHAMBER OF COMMERCE, 191 2 87 

held about six or eight hours a week, and that time should 
be taken, not out of the boy's time for recreation or sleep, 
but out of his employer's time during the day. That I be- 
lieve to be the most important thing to be done in this 
city in educational work in the near future. 

I welcome all worthy cooperation — I am not authorized 
to speak for the Board of Education of this city, but I risk 
nothing in saying this — that the Board of Education will 
welcome any suggestion, any help, any cooperation, that the 
Chamber of Commerce may give us. And perhaps you 
will permit me to say that one of the first things, one of 
the best ways, in which the Chamber of Commerce may 
help the educational authorities would be to establish, at 
least as an unwritten law, the custom, that in your offices, 
when boys apply to you for work, you will say to them, 
"Have you completed the elementary course?" If one 
says no, then say, "We advise you to go back to school." 
If the boy is in the High School of Commerce, or one of 
the commercial departments of the regular high schools, 
ask him if he has completed the work of that school. If 
he says no, you will say, — 

"How much of it have you taken ? " 

" I have taken two years." 

" Well, you go back and complete the other year, and 
then come to me." 

If the merchants of this town would insist that the boys 
and girls whom they take into their offices should complete 
the work of the schools before they go into business, 
they would have much better trained clerks than they have 
now, and they would accomplish more for commercial 
education than in any other way. 



IX 

WHY STUDENTS LEAVE HIGH SCHOOL 
BEFORE COMPLETING THE COURSE 

{From the Greater New York Report for igo6) 

EXTREMELY difficult it is to determine fully all the 
causes why so many pupils leave school without 
graduating. Undoubtedly, however, the chief cause is 
that many leave to go to work. Probably in the majority 
of such cases, the hard necessity of earning money is the 
controlling motive. Such students generally take supple- 
mentary courses in the evening high schools. Others there 
are who leave school to go to work, not because of necessity, 
but because of that restlessness of mind which comes to 
all students at the period of adolescence, and which is 
particularly marked amid the excitements of a large city. 

There are many, however, whose leaving school cannot 
be attributed to either of these causes. The following ex- 
planations are approximately true : — 

i. Children leave school because they have not the 
natural ability to cope with high school studies. The 
number of such children is, in my judgment, small. 

2. Children are withdrawn from high school by their 
parents because the latter fear that their children's health 
will be injured by what they regard as the excessive 
amount of home study required by some teachers. 

8S 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1906 89 

3. Children leave high school because they are be- 
wildered for a time and sometimes scared by a school 
atmosphere very different from the atmosphere of the 
elementary school which they left — an atmosphere in 
which the teacher stands more aloof and in which the 
pupil is thrown more on his own resources. 

4. A few pupils leave before graduation because they 
find that there are colleges which will receive them, despite 
their slender academic attainments, into the freshman 
class. 

These statements, I believe, summarize the reasons, as 
far as they are known at present, why children in such 
large numbers leave the high school without graduating. 
It must be the immediate duty of the educational authori- 
ties, and particularly of the Board of Superintendents, to 
remove the causes of dissatisfaction on the part both of 
parents and of pupils. 

In the first place it should be said that where a child, 
after a fair trial, is shown to possess mental powers of so 
inferior a nature that he cannot grasp the high school 
studies, he should not only not be prevented from leaving 
high school, but he should be encouraged to leave. It is 
far better for a boy who cannot study Latin and algebra 
and science to advantage that he should leave school 
and go to work — provided, however, that the school has 
nothing else to offer him that will stimulate his dormant 
faculties into activity. It may be that all such a boy 
requires is manual training or instruction in a trade. 
Before we can say definitely that a boy is too dull to 
pursue high school studies, we must know that he has 
failed in hand work as well as in head work, in science as 



QO WHY STUDENTS LEAVE HIGH SCHOOL 

well as in language. Hence I say that the number of 
students who are so dull is very few. The greatest defect 
in our school system to-day is that principals and teachers 
do not guide pupils, in selecting their high school courses, 
along the lines of their special aptitudes. For instance, a 
boy who has shown special ingenuity in the use of tools in 
the shop work class in the elementary school, should be 
encouraged to go to the manual training high school ; the 
boy who has evinced ability in literature, to the regular 
high school course, and so on. Some way must be found 
by which the principals and graduating teachers in ele- 
mentary schools shall be held responsible for the advice 
given to graduates as to their future courses. 

As to excessive home work there is undoubtedly cause 
for complaint. The root of the difficulty lies in the fact 
that each teacher teaches one subject and that some 
teachers are unreasonable in putting all possible pressure 
on their pupils to study their particular subjects. When 
four teachers compete for the home study time of the 
pupil, there is always the danger that the pressure will 
be excessive. Such pressure unfortunately bears more 
heavily on girls than on boys. Because they are so con- 
scientious, girls will try to accomplish all school tasks 
assigned them. Boys who are given too much to do, 
simply do not do it, and depend on their wits to get 
through somehow. Hence this foolish pressure falls most 
heavily on those who are least able to bear it. // is the 
business of the principals of high schools to prevent such 
pressure. In many cases, it is only too manifest that the 
principals have neglected this duty. It has, therefore, be- 
come the business of the Board of Superintendents to 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1906 91 

devise a plan, by which the principals will be under the 
necessity of exercising their authority to prevent undue 
pressure of home work upon their pupils. Such a plan is 
now under consideration. 

Even if the home work, however, were so adjusted that 
no child would be asked to do an unreasonable amount, 
there would still remain the difficulty, which many children 
experience in adapting themselves to a strange school 
environment and changed methods of discipline and in- 
struction. They have come from an elementary school 
near their homes; they are now going to a high school a 
long distance from their homes. They have come from 
the midst of scenes and faces that have been familiar for 
years ; they are transferred to scenes that are strange and 
placed among pupils and teachers whom they do not know 
and by whom they are not known. In the elementary 
school there was a kindly teacher to smooth over every 
obstacle and to aid them in every difficulty ; in the high 
school the pupil is thrown — and rightly so, because he is 
more mature — on his own resources, and too often left 
to sink or swim by his own unaided efforts. Add to this, 
that many of the children who enter high school have no 
place to study their home lessons, except among the noises 
and confusion of a room which often serves all the purposes 
of a dining room and kitchen, as well as a living room, 
for a large family, and we may form some faint idea of 
the difficulties which confront the child when he enters 
high school. The difficulties seem to him insurmountable ; 
is it any wonder that he begs his parents to let him leave 
school and go to work ? 

Surely, it is our duty to remove the obstacles from the 



92 WHY STUDENTS LEAVE HIGH SCHOOL 

path of the high school pupil as far as we can, particularly 
in the first year, for there it is where the greatest tendency 
to leave is found. I have pointed out one way in which 
this may be done — namely, by lessening the amount of 
home work. But this is not all that is needed. The high 
school pupil, particularly in his first year, needs kindly 
advice and assistance, not as a unit in a class, but as an 
individual, a person. He needs to have the weak places 
not only in his scholarship, but in his character, discovered ; 
and he needs to be shown how to strengthen them. At 
least he should be made to feel that there is some one who 
is thinking of him, not as a cog in a great complex ma- 
chine, but as a human being who is capable of friendship 
and gratitude. Alike in the small academy and the small 
college of former days, such sympathy and support were 
found by the student in president or principal and teachers, 
who had time and opportunity to become intimately ac- 
quainted with each individual student. In the great over- 
grown city high school, time and opportunity for this most 
important work are both wanting. And yet it is work that 
must be done, if our high schools are to render their full 
service to the community. 

One way that might be suggested would be to appoint 
tutors whose sole duty it would be to give individual assist- 
ance to students, to advise with them regarding their 
studies and their amusements, to guide them in their read- 
ing, and to assist them in difficulties. Such is the plan 
which Princeton College has recently put into practice, 
adopting a modified form of the Oxford tutorial system. 
There are two serious objections to adopting this plan for 
high schools. The first is that it does not provide for one 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1906 93 

of our greatest difficulties — the fact that a considerable 
proportion of high school students have no suitable place 
or opportunity to study their lessons at home. The second 
is the enormous expense involved. To appoint a sufficient 
number of tutors to help every high school student indi- 
vidually, would almost double the cost of the high schools 
— a cost which is already high and which is increasing too 
rapidly. The third objection is that it would be practically 
impossible to find a sufficient number of tutors of the right 
kind. A tutor whose duty it is to guide rather than to 
teach, must be a person of experience as well as scholar- 
ship ; he must be possessed of infinite tact, sympathy, 
patience, and power of reading character. No fledgling 
teachers would answer for this purpose. Even if we had 
the money to pay them, teachers possessing the requisite 
qualities are not to be found in the numbers that would 
be required. Realizing the impossibility of overcoming 
these objections, I do not recommend the adoption of the 
tutorial plan. 

What then is to be done ? Are we to continue to watch 
thousands of children leave our high schools each year 
without obtaining that intellectual training which the high 
schools can give, simply because the conditions of urban 
life compel us to erect enormous buildings and organize 
gigantic schools? Surely not. Our ingenuity ought to be 
equal to the task of neutralizing the evils forced upon us 
by the conditions under which we are compelled to work. 
Without claiming to have solved the problem with which 
we are confronted, I beg leave to submit the following 
plan : — 

1. Keep the high school buildings open until five o'clock 



94 WHY STUDENTS LEAVE HIGH SCHOOL 

each afternoon except Saturday, and on Saturday until 
noon. 

2. Require a certain proportion of the teachers to re- 
main each afternoon and to be present on Saturday morn- 
ing for the purpose of advising and assisting pupils. 

3. Permit all pupils who desire advice from their teach- 
ers or who wish to study their lessons in school or to read 
in the school library, to remain for as long or as short a 
time as they please within the prescribed hours. Only 
two conditions should be made : parents should in all 
cases give their consent, and each child who remains should, 
for obvious reasons, be required to take half an hour's 
exercise in the school gymnasium. 

The advantages of this plan are manifold. It will 
utilize the school buildings more fully than at present. It 
will secure to each pupil favorable conditions for study. 
It will enable him to obtain needed advice and assistance 
from those best able to give advice and assistance — his 
teachers. It will afford the teachers an opportunity, through 
private conference, to obtain an insight into the character 
of their pupils which they could not gain in any other way, 
and so will react favorably on the work of the classroom, 
and, lastly, it may be put into operation at a very slight 
cost. 

Objections to the plan may be expected from two 
sources — the janitors and some of the teachers. The 
janitors and their friends oppose any and every plan of 
school work which will increase in any way their labor. 
Clamor from the janitors may, therefore, be expected. 
Opposition on the part of the teachers will come, I believe, 
only from a small minority. The great majority will favor 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1909 95 

any plan that will lead to the retention of a larger number 
of high school students in school and that will increase the 
efficiency of the schools. Of course, if additional labor is 
required on the part of the teachers, there should be pro- 
portionately greater remuneration. 

A VOCATION BUREAU A MEANS OF RETAINING STUDENTS 

IN HIGH SCHOOL 

{From the Greater New York Report for igog) 

In former reports I have dwelt in some detail on the 
causes that induce so many students to leave high school 
before completing the course. Briefly stated they are : 
(1) the dire necessity of earning money in order to increase 
the family income ; (2) the attraction of good wages even 
to those who are not compelled by poverty to work ; (3) 
the restless activity which leads boys in large numbers, 
and many girls, to prefer labor, no matter how humble, to 
what they regard as the irksome task of learning in school ; 
and (4) lack of intellectual ability to pursue the higher 
studies. To these causes must be added a few cases in 
which students leave school because of lack of tact on the 
part of teachers in dealing with them. The first cause it 
is difficult to see how to deal with. Charitable assistance 
is not to be thought of, and any system of scholarships 
founded on competitive examinations would probably not 
reach, or reach only slightly, the class intended. The 
second and third classes would remain in school if the em- 
ployers of labor in our city would unite in refusing appli- 
cants for employment until they had completed a certain 
amount of school work, or if they would at least give the 



96 WHY STUDENTS LEAVE HIGH SCHOOL 

preference to those who graduate. It is idle to expect, 
however, that employers of labor will take such action, 
though it would be greatly to their interest, until the 
matter is brought forcibly to their attention. Some work 
of the most beneficent character has already been done 
along these lines by a self-appointed committee of high 
school teachers, under the chairmanship of Mr. Eli W. 
Weaver of the Boys' High School, Brooklyn. The work 
thus happily commenced should be officially recognized 
and greatly amplified. The Board of Education would do 
well to organize a vocation or employment bureau with 
Mr. Weaver, who has shown rare capacity for such work, at 
its head. The special field of labor for such a bureau would 
be to bring to the attention of employers of labor the various 
kinds of training given in the public schools, to ascertain 
from principals and teachers and, in some cases, from the 
young people themselves, the kind of work for which each is 
best suited, and to aid in placing each student in a position 
in which his talents will have scope to develop. The small 
cost of such a bureau would be a mere nothing compared 
with the good it would^ accomplish. 

The fourth class of those who leave high school without 
completing the course — those who are not intellectually 
able to do, or have no taste for, academic work — should 
really never enter a high school. They now cost your 
Board a large amount of money for teachers in the first 
and second terms of the high school course, who, were it 
not for their presence, would not be needed. They re- 
ceive little benefit from attending high school for a few 
months and would be much better off in a trade school. 

The statistics of the past year bear witness to the fact, 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1909 97 

to which I have repeatedly called attention, that students 
leave vocational or semi-vocational courses, such as com- 
mercial courses or manual training courses, more readily 
than they leave the standard academic course. The rea- 
son is that those who take the academic course generally 
do so with the object of preparing to enter higher institu- 
tions, and must remain, in order to attain their object, if 
not to graduate, at least for the greater part of the course ; 
while many of those who take the vocational or semi- 
vocational courses leave as soon as they receive such a 
smattering of shop practice or stenography and typewriting 
as enables them to obtain a situation. For many of the 
latter class of students our evening high schools become 
genuine continuation schools. Their leaving school so 
early, however, is a great loss to themselves and a great 
loss to the efficiency of our manufacturing and commercial 
interests. It is believed that the establishment of a voca- 
tion bureau such as I have recommended would do much 
to remedy this great evil by securing suitable positions for 
deserving and well-prepared boys and girls, and by pre- 
venting, through refusal to recommend, the employment of 
the immature and ill-prepared. 



X 

QUALIFICATIONS OF HIGH SCHOOL 
TEACHERS 

(From the Greater New York Report for i8gg) 

IN ASMUCH as the strongest attacks made upon the license 
system have been instituted against the requirements 
just quoted, I think it right to state with some degree of 
fullness the principles that guided the Board of Education 
in adopting and the City Superintendent in recommending 
requirements for high school licenses of a higher order 
than the requirements for licenses to teach in the elemen- 
tary schools. 

The training of the citizen is the most vital concern of 
the state. In the secondary schools, or high schools, are 
trained most of the 'men who become prominent in the 
various walks of life, and most of the men and women who 
become teachers of children in the elementary schools. In 
defense of property and health, the state sets a standard 
for admission to the practice of law and medicine. The 
welfare of the child whose character is molded in the 
public schools is surely deserving of at least as careful 
safeguarding. And in elementary education such protec- 
tive measures have been taken. It was a long step forward 
— a longer step than has as yet been taken, I believe, by 
any other state in the Union — when in 1895 the statute 

98 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1899 99 

was enacted that no one should be licensed or employed to 
teach in primary or grammar grades in any city of the 
state who had not had three years of experience in teach- 
ing, or in lieu thereof had not graduated at least from a 
high school and from a course of professional training of 
at least one year. 

But the work in the elementary school — primary and 
grammar grades — differs materially from the work in 
secondary schools, and the qualifications of teachers should 
differ accordingly. The work of the teacher in the 
elementary schools differs from the work of the teacher in 
the secondary schools, first, with regard to the pupils and, 
second, with regard to the knowledge the teacher is called 
upon to impart. In the elementary schools the pupils are 
little children. They are easy to guide and influence. 
They are impressionable, but forgetful. Mistakes made in 
their training may be remedied by wiser measures at a 
later day. In the secondary school, on the other hand, 
where the pupils vary in age from thirteen or 'fourteen to 
seventeen or eighteen, are found adolescents of rapidly 
developing individuality and force of character, critical, 
exacting, self-conscious, possessing the sense of personality 
of adults, but lacking the self-control that is taught by 
the discipline of life. Errors in training at the period of 
emotional adolescence, when impressions strike deep and 
endure long, are almost ineradicable. Mistakes in training 
during the secondary school age are much more likely to 
be fatal than mistakes in training during the elementary 
school age. Hence peculiar tact and energy and insight 
are needed by teachers who direct and instruct girls and 
boys of the high school age. 



IOO QUALIFICATIONS OF HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS 

In the second place, the character of the knowledge 
with which teacher and pupil deal in the secondary school 
is very different from the knowledge with which teacher 
and pupil deal in the elementary school, just as in turn 
secondary school subject matter and methods differ from 
those of the college. During the elementary stage of 
school life — say from the sixth year to the fourteenth 
year — the child seizes upon the world with feeling and 
with imagination rather than with reason and insight. The 
knowledge he gains is not a knowledge of isolated facts, 
and it is still less a knowledge of scientific principles. 
Relations, as far as they appeal to him at all, are felt rather 
than perceived, — they are felt as personal to him — to his 
present interests and needs — rather than thought of as 
universal in significance. Hence we no longer speak of 
teaching botany or zoology in the elementary school, but 
of nature study ; by which we mean that a child should 
have lived with nature and learned to love her before 
he begins to occupy himself chiefly with classifying her 
phenomena. When the child enters the secondary or 
high school he has become interested in each of the main 
fields of knowledge, has gained some command over the 
tools with which knowledge is discovered and extended, 
and has, more or less incidentally, learned a vast number 
of facts — facts of natural science, facts of history, facts 
of life. The high school or academy, on the other hand, 
while deepening, strengthening, and extending the student's 
knowledge, in the field of natural science, for instance, is 
occupied largely with classification and arrangement and 
to some extent also with application. The pifpil learns to 
compare and arrange his facts into sciences — botany, zool- 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1899 IOI 

ogy, chemistry, physics — ■ and this very process enables 
him to acquire new knowledge all the more rapidly and 
thoroughly. In the study of history, too, of mathematics, 
and of languages, the pupil likewise learns to apply his 
faculties more maturely, more scientifically, than in the 
studies of the elementary school. In the college, again, 
the student may confine himself to a smaller number of 
studies than he took in the academy or high school, but he 
goes much more deeply into them ; he studies one knowl- 
edge in the light of other knowledges ; and, what is of 
still greater value, he is mature enough to comprehend the 
bearings of what he studies on the problems of life. There 
are not, to be sure, hard and fast lines separating the ele- 
mentary school from the high school and the high school 
from the college. On the contrary, the different divisions 
shade off into one another so that it is extremely difficult 
to say where one begins and the other ends. In the last 
year of the great city high school the work is often distinctly 
collegiate . in character; and, in like manner, the last two 
years — the seventh and the eighth — of the elementary 
school are at least half secondary in character. 

Now, if I am right in holding that the pupils in the ele- 
mentary schools are radically different in character from 
the pupils in the high schools, and that the knowledge to 
be taught in the elementary school differs from the 
knowledge to be taught in the high school as empiricism 
differs from science, it follows that the high school teacher 
should be not only more extensively and scientifically in- 
formed than it is reasonable to expect or require the ele- 
mentary school teacher to be, but that he should have under- 
gone that training which is needed to fit him to deal as a 



102 QUALIFICATIONS OF HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS 

teacher with adolescent pupils and to impart organic 
instruction. 

What, then, should the distinctive qualifications of the 
high school teacher be ? 

In an address before the Department of Superintendence 
of the National Educational Association last February, 
Dr. James E. Russell classified these qualifications under 
the head of general knowledge, professional knowledge, 
special knowledge, and technical skill, and I adopt his 
classification because I cannot think of any other that is 
better or nearly so good. " The degree of scholarship re- 
quired for secondary teachers," says the Report of the 
Committee of Fifteen, " is by common consent fixed at a 
collegiate education. No one — with rare exceptions — 
should be employed to teach in a high school who has not 
this fundamental preparation." The reason is not far to 
seek : The knowledge to be taught — be it language, 
biology, mathematics, or what not — is scientific knowl- 
edge, and hence the teacher should have studied the 
languages and the sciences in the light of one another, by 
the comparative method ; the pupils to be taught are in the 
period of adolescence, " the period of beginnings, a tran- 
sition period, of mental storm and stress, in which egoism 
gives way to altruism, romance has charm, and the social, 
moral, and religious feelings bud and bloom," and hence 
the teacher should himself have studied the knowledges in 
their bearings on the problems of life, that he may give 
wise and adequate guidance to those committed to his 
charge. 

Second, professional knowledge. • Here I quote Dr. 
Russell's own words : — 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1899 1 03 

It is equally important that the secondary teacher be able to view his own 
subject, and the entire course of instruction in its relations to the child and to 
society, of which the child is a part. A teacher may be able to teach his sub- 
ject never so well, may even have the reputation of being a distinguished ed- 
ucator, yet his life long be a teacher of Latin or physics, or history, rather 
than a teacher of children. The true educator must know the nature of mind, 
he must understand the process of learning, the formation of ideals, the devel- 
opment of will, and the growth of character. The secondary teacher needs 
particularly to know the psychology of the adolescent period — that stormy 
period in which the individual first becomes self-conscious and struggles to 
express his own personality. But more than man as an individual, a teacher 
needs to know the nature of man as a social being. No knowledge, 1 believe, 
is of more worth to the secondary teacher than the knowledge of what stand- 
ards of culture have prevailed in the past or now exist among various peoples, 
their ideals of life, and their methods of training the young to assume the 
duties of life. Such study of the history of education is more than a study of 
scholastic institutions, of didactic precepts, or the theories of educationists; it 
is Kulturgeschichte with special reference to educational needs and educational 
problems. It gives that unifying view of our professional work without which 
it is idle to talk of a science or a system of education; it prepares the way for 
the only philosophy of education which is worth teaching. 

Third, special knowledge. By special knowledge I 
mean knowledge of the subject the teacher is to teach. 
The departmental system has completely taken possession 
of the high schools. The teachers are supposed to be 
specialists in their various branches. They certainly 
ought to be. As a rule, the average college graduate, 
though he may have the required general knowledge, has 
not the necessary special knowledge. The normal school 
graduate certainly has it not. And what a sorry teacher 
the high school teacher is who has not a thorough, com- 
plete grasp of his subject! How can a man be a special- 
ist in mathematics who does not know the higher reaches 
of his subject? Or a specialist in history, who has read 
none but school histories ? Or a specialist in anything 
who has to burn the midnight oil in order to learn the les- 



104 QUALIFICATIONS OF HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS 

son he will give next day to his pupils ? Such a man is 
the slave of the textbook. His sole object is to get his 
pupils through examinations, not to prepare them for life. 
Such teachers we do not want in the New York high schools. 
We need men and women of broad general culture who 
have also devoted much time to the thorough mastery of 
the special subject they are required to teach. 

This work, however, might well be coupled with the 
fourth requisite, technical skill in teaching. Here again I 
shall adopt as my own Dr. Russell's language : — 

Graduates of colleges and normal schools alike must fail in technical skill 
if they teach as they have been taught. The work of the secondary school is 
unique. It requires an arrangement and presentation of the subject matter of 
instruction in a way unknown in elementary education and unheeded in most 
college teaching ; it requires tact, judgment, and disciplinary powers peculiar 
to the management of youth. Herein is the need of that technical skill which 
is not, as has been well said, " a part of the natural equipment of every edu- 
cated person." 

For the acquirement of this technical skill we must look 
to our universities and teachers' colleges. Columbia, 
Harvard, and Brown are taking the lead in this work and, 
if a demand is created, the other great universities, we 
may be sure, will lose no time in following their example. 

If, then, it is admitted that these four qualifications — 
general knowledge, professional knowledge, special knowl- 
edge, and technical skill — are essential to the successful 
high school teacher, the defense of the minimum require- 
ments for high school licenses is complete. These re- 
quirements provide for precisely these qualifications. The 
requirement of a college education meets more or less 
adequately the necessity for general knowledge on the 
teacher's part ; and the recognition of special postgradu- 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1899 105 

ate studies, or, in lieu thereof, the requirement of experi- 
ence in teaching the special branch for which the license is 
desired, insures the possession of the indispensable special 
knowledge ; while, as for professional knowledge and skill, 
these are called for, as fully as may be, by the requirement 
of suitable experience or of professional study. In all 
cases, candidates for high school licenses are examined 
on the science of education. 

" But," some one will object, " these regulations prevent 
the promotion of teachers from the elementary grades to 
the high school grades." By no means, I reply, because 
provision is made for the licensing as high school teachers 
of persons who have had eight years of experience, pro- 
vided they show, through examination, that they have 
pursued the necessary studies and acquired the necessary 
culture. I regret, however, that the rules do not restrict 
the selection of such teachers to those who have had ex- 
perience in the seventh and eighth years of the elementary 
school, because the work of these years is, as I have 
pointed out, partially secondary and partially elementary 
in character. Experience gained below the seventh year 
of the elementary school I regard as very nearly use- 
less as a preparation for high school teaching ; and the 
younger the children are with whom the experience is 
obtained, the less valuable for high school purposes does 
it become. A woman, for instance, who had become thor- 
oughly saturated with the methods of teaching little chil- 
dren in the kindergarten would, as a general rule, be 
wholly unfitted to deal with the boys and girls of the high 
school. So different is the attitude of the teacher's mind 
toward the infant of five from that which the teacher must 



106 QUALIFICATIONS OF HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS 

assume toward the adolescent of fifteen. The teacher 
whose attitude of mind toward a certain type of pupil has 
become fixed by habit, is practically precluded from the 
successful teaching of pupils of another type. This is one 
of the least satisfactory results of the graded school. In 
the ungraded country school the teacher's mind remains 
more plastic, because he is called upon to deal with all sorts 
and conditions of pupils. In the graded school, on the 
other hand, the teacher is constantly teaching children who 
are as nearly alike as possible in age, attainments, and char- 
acter. Hence, under the graded system, the teacher's atti- 
tude of mind toward a certain class of pupils is constantly 
being stereotyped, so to speak. The experiment of assign- 
ing a teacher who has become habituated to dealing with 
very young children to a class of older children is fraught 
with danger not only to the children, but to the teacher 
herself. 

In addition, however, to seeing that candidates for high 
school licenses possess the technical qualifications required 
for eligibility, it has been found necessary to institute some- 
what rigorous examinations to ascertain the character of 
their scholarship and their professional fitness. My ex- 
perience as superintendent of schools in Brooklyn and 
as chairman of the Board of Examiners of New York has 
amply demonstrated that examinations are a necessary 
safeguard in selecting teachers. All other available means 
combined — investigation of record in teaching and studies, 
testimonials, personal interview, observation of work — are 
insufficient to guard against mistakes in selection. The 
careful analysis of a candidate's answers to written and 
oral tests in the subject matter of his specialty and in 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1899 107 

the science of education and methods of teaching is an 
indispensable feature of the inquiry. Take, for example, 
the teachers in private secondary schools who are now in 
great numbers seeking admission to the public high schools. 
The opportunities afforded these teachers for private tutor- 
ing have been many and attractive. Under such circum- 
stances the teacher is tempted to spend the time he ought 
to devote to study in working for money, and his regular 
stipend has unfortunately adjusted itself to the situation. 
When such a teacher comes before an examining board, he 
realizes his mistake. He finds that he has not given suffi- 
cient thought to the principles underlying his work, and he 
finds that he has not the scholarship he wishes he had, and 
that he now recognizes he ought to have. Within the 
short experience of the Board of Examiners, it has several 
times happened that teachers of this kind, failing in a first 
examination, have responded to the stimulus and in course 
of time have redeemed themselves by carrying out definite 
plans of professional improvement. Examinations, when 
rightly conducted, may thus furnish a stimulus, as well as 
a test and a standard. 



XI 

TRADE SCHOOLS 

In his Annual Report for 1900 Dr. Maxwell started the agitation which re- 
sulted in the establishment of several evening trade schools, which are fre- 
quented chiefly by apprentices, in the organization in 1 9 10 of a day trade 
school for boys — the Boys' Vocational School, and in taking over from its 
founders the Manhattan Trade School for Girls. — The Editors. 

{From the Greater New York Report for igoo) 

THE manual training high school, as it has been de- 
veloped in this country, does not teach trades. Yet 
there is, I believe, a great necessity for schools that will do 
this very thing. In our crowded tenement-house neighbor- 
hoods there are thousands of boys who must leave school 
the moment the compulsory education law allows. They 
have the rudiments of an English education, but they are 
sadly at a loss as to how to earn a living. It is too often 
a desperate and hopeless struggle. The education the boy 
has received has not gone far enough. It has been suf- 
ficient to create in him tastes for things higher and better 
than those which he finds in his sordid surroundings, but 
it has not been sufficient to give him any art by which he 
may earn a living. As the old opportunities for appren- 
ticeship no longer exist, a well organized and equipped 
trade school would be the thing most desirable for such a 
boy. Not a year should be added to his schooling beyond 

108 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1905 109 

the compulsory age if he must then go forth to fight for 
his living ; but he should be taken out of the elementary 
school when he has finished the sixth year and allowed to 
spend the next two years, or until he is fourteen, 1 in learn- 
ing not only history and composition, but some trade 
whereby he can earn a living. The city would be amply 
repaid for the expense of establishing and maintaining 
such schools by the increased army of skilled workmen 
they would produce, while they would bring untold bless- 
ings to the poor of this city. 

Nor need the establishment of such schools add much, 
if anything, to the cost of the schools. If a large propor- 
tion of the boys in the four highest grades of the elementary 
schools in the tenement-house districts were to elect to 
enter the trade schools when established, many classrooms 
would be left vacant which would be immediately filled. 
In other words, as the proposed trade schools would form 
a part, not of the high school, but of the elementary school 
system, the buildings intended for them would take the 
place of the elementary school buildings which otherwise 
it would be necessary to erect. 

(From the Annual Report for igoj) 

Reference has been made in this report to the experi- 
ment of utilizing the plant of our manual training high 
schools in the evening for trade school purposes. The ex- 
periment has been upon the whole successful. The work 
is yet only in its infancy, however. It needs to be system- 
atized and developed. 

1 Dr. Maxwell has, since this was written, modified his views as to the age 
at which a boy may begin to learn a trade. He now thinks that fourteen is 
early enough. — The Editors, 



IIO TRADE SCHOOLS 

The economic necessity for free public trade schools is 
admirably set forth in an address recently delivered by Mr. 
Frank A. Vanderlip, of the National City Bank, who, by 
personal experience and by profound study of economic 
and labor conditions at home and abroad, is qualified to 
speak authoritatively on the subject. The following ex- 
tracts from this address present the chief points of his 
argument : — 

It is true that we are still proud, and have much good reason to be proud, 
of our success in international competition. We have seen our exports of 
manufactured products double and double again. We have seen, with justi- 
fiable pride, that we are able to make many manufactured articles of commerce 
more cheaply than any other people in the world can make them. We have 
combined with the advantage of unexampled supplies of raw material an un- 
equaled genius for doing things on a great scale. With notable clearness we 
have seen the economic advantages of great industrial combinations. We 
have been quick to recognize industrial waste, whether in the form of unneeded 
labor, of loss of by-products, or of unnecessary transportation. To reduce 
waste in the form of unnecessary labor, we have taken full advantage of every 
ingenious machine which our remarkable talent for mechanical invention 
could devise. We have brought together industrial units into huge combina- 
tions, and have then administered them with such far-seeing wisdom that we 
have been able to produce certain great staple articles of manufacture so 
cheaply that our competition has been the despair of other nations. . . . 

It is something of a shock to reflect that practically every victory we have 
gained in international competition has turned on considerations of cheap- 
ness and not on considerations of quality. Our talent for mechanical inven- 
tion seems unequaled, and it has won us many victories, it is true; but aside 
from the advantage which that special ingenuity gives us, there are few articles 
we bring to the international market upon which we would dare rest our suc- 
cess solely on claims of high-grade workmanship. Wherever we have won 
success we have, as a rule, won it because we could manufacture, en masse, 
with wonderful economy. We have been successful because we could 
make a thing cheaper than our competitors, not because we could make it 
better. . . . 

If real accuracy of workmanship is wanted, if artistic form and taste are de- 
sired, if thoroughly skilled and trustworthy handicraft is sought, it will not, 
as a rule, be found in a display of American wares. If we look for a produc- 



GREATER NEW YORK RERORT, 1905 III 

tion that has had worked into it some of the soul and the character of the 
workman who made it, we will rarely find it bearing the legend, " Made in 
America." . . . 

But, with all these advantages which have come to us, we are beginning to 
find that there are some countervailing losses. While we have made it possi- 
ble for the unskilled man to tend some marvelous automatic machine and turn 
out the product with wonderful economy, we are now beginning to find that 
in keeping that man closely confined to tending the automatic machine, in 
giving him no intellectual interest in his work and no opportunity for any but 
the narrowest outlook upon the field of industry in which he is engaged, we 
have, unintentionally, taken almost certain means to prevent his mental and 
technical development. . . . 

I have made a somewhat careful study of Germany's economic success, and 
in doing that I have become firmly convinced that the explanation of the re- 
markable progress there is to be traced, in the most direct manner, to the 
German system of education. The schoolmaster is the great cornerstone of 
Germany's remarkable commercial and industrial progress. The school sys- 
tem of Germany bears a relation to the economic situation that is not met 
with in any other country. . . . 

There is a division of instruction in Germany known as continuation trade 
schools. These schools are designed for the instruction of youths engaged in 
regular industrial employment. They are auxiliary to the ordinary school 
system and entirely outside of the scheme for regular academic training or 
of higher technical instruction. They are for the rank and file of workers, 
for the privates of the industrial army. The courses are so arranged that they 
supplement the cultural training that the youths have had in the regular 
school system and, at the same time, supplement the technical routine of the 
shop or the office. 

The students in these trade schools, you understand, are youths who have 
completed the regular compulsory educational course and have gone out into 
the ranks of active industrial and commercial workers. The hours of instruc- 
tion are so arranged that they fall outside of the regular hours of labor in shop 
or office. The curriculum is broadly practical. It includes the science of each 
particular trade — its mathematics or chemistry for instance — and its tech- 
nology. But it does not stop there. Principles of wise business management 
are taught. The aim is to prepare a student for the practical conduct of a 
business. He gains knowledge of production and consumption, of markets 
and of the causes of price fluctuation. He is put into a position to acquire 
an insight into concrete business relations, and into trade practices and con- 
ditions. Are not those aims worthy of our schools ? What truer democracy 
can there be than to have a school system that will point the way to every 
worker, no matter how humble, by which he may reach a clearer comprehen- 



112 - TRADE SCHOOLS 

sion of the industry in which he is engaged, and with the aid of this knowledge 
may rise to a position of importance in that industry ? . . . 

The forces of combination — the labor union and the trusts — are united and 
are working in harmony to accomplish at least one thing. They are united 
in a tendency to make, of a great percentage of our population, commercial or 
industrial automatons. They both tend to subdivide labor, and thereby limit 
the opportunity to acquire a comprehension of broad principles. They both 
tend to circumscribe the field of the apprentice, narrowing his opportunity, 
forcing him into petty specialization, and restricting his free and intelligent 
development. All this is placing us in grave danger of evolving an industrial 
race of automatic workers, without diversity of skill, without an understand- 
ing of principles, and without a breadth of capacity. There is but one power 
that can counteract that tendency — that power is the schoolmaster. These 
youths who can gain from their daily work only that narrow, routine, techni- 
cal experience, which in the main is all that the conditions of modern industry 
offer, have a right to demand something more. They have a right to demand 
the opportunity for a practical education. As modern conditions narrow their 
technical training, those same conditions broaden the opportunity for the man 
who does acquire knowledge which will give him a grasp of more than a single 
detail of his business. . . . 

Let me summarize my convictions on this subject. We have in a brief 
period built up a striking industrial success. The main elements of that suc- 
cess have been threefold. First, cheap raw material. Second, ingenious 
labor-saving inventions. Third, industrial combinations resulting in the 
great economies of production on a large scale. Our success in the 
international markets has in the main been built on cheapness, not on 
quality. 

The very nature of our success has been such that it has minimized the 
value of superior handicraft. The character of large-scale production, the 
effect of the subdivision of labor, and the result of extensive use of labor- 
saving devices have united in tending to make automatons of our workers. 
That tendency is of necessity increased by some phases of the organization of 
labor. 

The result is a changed order in industrial life. In many fields of industry, 
indeed in many phases of commercial life also, it is only the rarely exceptional 
man who is able to raise himself above the deadening influence of his sur- 
roundings — surroundings that give him a single specialized task to perform 
and which demand of him no intellectual interest, no understanding of the 
principles of the industry, no ambition for a broader technical skill. 

The man without intellectual interest in his work, without understanding 
of the relation of his task to other things, and without ambition pushing him 
steadily toward technical improvement, is in a dangerous position. 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1905 1 13 

Assuming that the picture drawn by Mr. Vanderlip of 
the blighting effects of modern industrial conditions on 
the workman is accurate, we may well pause to inquire 
whether we are doing all that the interests of the com- 
munity and the individual demand to train workmen 
who understand the relation of their tasks to other 
things, who grasp the principles that underlie processes, 
and who push steadily forward toward technical im- 
provement. 

The Moseley Commissioners who visited us from England 
were in accord with Mr. Vanderlip in regarding the lack 
of trade schools for workmen as the chief defect of Ameri- 
can public education. 

I am disposed to think that Mr. Vanderlip undervalues 
the effect which the manual training exercises of the ele- 
mentary school and the more specialized work of the man- 
ual training high school will eventually have on industrial 
conditions. Even if, however, manual training should pro- 
duce all the results its advocates claim for it, there is 
still an urgent necessity for the trade school proper. But 
as to what is the best kind of trade school, what is the best 
course of study for such an institution, what is the best 
method of administering it, we are all profoundly ignorant. 
We have made an experiment in a small way, it is true. 
As far as it goes, it has been successful. But upon what 
lines it shall be developed, is still a question. The best 
models — the models we should imitate or improve upon — 
are to be found in England and Germany, particularly 
the latter. It is our duty to study these models, and 
to take from them those elements best suited to our 
needs. 



114 TRADE SCHOOLS 

{From the Annual Report for igob) 

In former reports I have dwelt upon the wisdom, indeed 
the necessity, of establishing trade schools as a part of the 
public school system. There are thousands of pupils who 
would be much better off learning a trade in school than in 
memorizing geographical facts or wrestling with the diffi- 
culties of Latin grammar. Educators from other lands tell 
us that the great defect of our public school system is the 
lack of trade and technical schools. When a leading econ- 
omist makes the statement, which no one has attempted to 
contradict, that, of the enormous exports from the United 
States, not a single article is sold on account of its superior 
workmanship, it is surely time for those intrusted with edu- 
cational administration, not in this city alone, but through- 
out this nation, to take heed whether the fault does not lie 
with the schools, which have done little for the trades. 

True, New York City is rather before than behind other 
cities in providing trade schools. We have established two 
evening trade schools — one in Brooklyn and one in Long 
Island City, and a day -technical school for girls (Washing- 
ton Irving High School) ; but these institutions have been 
only moderately successful. In the manual training work of 
the elementary and high schools we have the touchstone by 
which to determine whether a boy or a girl possesses me- 
chanical aptitudes ; but here we stop short. We have not 
provided the means of training in specific trades the pupils 
who are endowed with these special aptitudes. 

There are many difficulties in the way of establishing 
trade schools. The chief difficulty, however, is that we 
have no traditions to guide us, no standards by which to 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 115 

measure our work, no fund of experience from which to draw 
in organizing schools of a type distinctly different from any 
we have yet established. Where are we to obtain such tradi- 
tions, such standards, such experience ? Evidently in those 
countries of Europe, particularly Germany, where the trade 
school has reached its highest perfection. I recommend, 
therefore, that your Board send one or two of your super- 
intendents to Europe f or a sufficient length of time to make 
a thorough study on the ground of the various European 
types of trade schools, and to report those features which 
seem best adapted to the training of the American boy 
and the advancement of American industry. Mr. Alfred 
Moseley, with unexampled energy and generosity, is show- 
ing us how the teachers of England may profit by a study of 
American schools and American teachers. His great work 
involves a high tribute to the efficiency of our educational 
institutions. We should not forget, however, that we have 
much to learn from the schools of Europe, particularly from 
her trade schools. 

{From the Annual Report for igoy") 

Since the publication of my Eighth Annual Report, 
nothing has been done in this city toward the establish- 
ment of trade schools except to improve and strengthen 
the two evening trade and technical schools established in 
the Manual Training High School of Brooklyn and the 
Bryant High School, Long Island City, and to establish an 
evening trade school for colored people in Brooklyn in 
Public School 5, similar to the trade school for colored 
people organized in Evening School 67, Manhattan. In 
the meantime, however, considerable progress has been 



Il6 TRADE SCHOOLS 

made in other parts of the country in trade or industrial 
education. In pursuance of the recommendations made 
by the Industrial School Commission appointed by Governor 
Douglas of Massachusetts, and under the fostering care 
of the legislature of that state, many trade schools have 
been established. Similar institutions are growing up in 
the West. Everywhere among thinking people the opinion 
is gaining ground that trade schools are necessary to pro- 
vide training in the arts and crafts for the vast number of 
young people who are overcrowding the ranks of clerks 
and salesmen and the professions, to supply necessary 
skilled labor for manufacturing industries, and to enhance 
the value of American manufactured products. In a work 
of this kind the New York City public school system ought 
to hold the foremost rank, because our city is not only the 
greatest commercial center but the greatest manufacturing 
center in the United States. I repeat my recommendation, 
therefore, of a year ago, that as many members of your 
supervising force, as may be necessary, be sent to Europe 
and to different parts of this country to make a thorough 
study of trade schools, 'to the end that New York City may 
organize this work, which is inevitably coming, on a truly 
scientific basis. 

Because of its enormous foreign population, as well as 
for the reasons given above, New York City stands sorely 
in need of trade schools. There are tens of thousands of 
children leaving our schools every year at fourteen years 
of age to go to work who have not completed even the 
elementary school course and who, under present condi- 
tions, have not acquired any art by which to earn a liveli- 
hood. They are turned loose on the community either to 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1908 1 17 

make their living by their wits or to eke out a miserable 
livelihood by unskilled labor. 

Whatever attempts to teach trades to children may be 
made in the future, the experience of other countries 
and of other parts of this country very clearly demonstrates 
that these attempts will be successful only when under- 
taken with the approval and cooperation both of employers 
of labor and of trades unions. 

• (From the Annual Report for igo8) 

The establishment of trade schools by the public school 
authorities is now a matter of discussion in every manu- 
facturing city in the land. Manufacturers and philan- 
thropists alike are clamoring for the introduction of 
" industrial training" into the public schools. Manufac- 
turers, because of the decay of the apprenticeship system 
and because skilled workmen are coming in constantly 
decreasing numbers from northwestern Europe, are con- 
fronted with a deficiency of skilled labor. In their zeal to 
have the public schools assume the burden which for three 
thousand years has been regarded as the duty of the manu- 
facturer—the training of the artisan — some manufac- 
turers even go to the length of asserting that, because the 
public schools do not turn out workmen skilled in the 
various trades, they have signally failed in their duty. 
Philanthropists, on the other hand, who see the difficulties 
the children of the poor must contend with in fitting them- 
selves to rise out of the ranks of the unskilled and who 
deprecate the all too prevalent ambition to enter clerical 
pursuits or the professions, are equally strenuous in urging 
public school authorities to undertake industrial education. 









n8 TRADE SCHOOLS 

The true reason for industrial education lies not in the 
partially selfish arguments of manufacturers nor in the 
semi-charitable views of philanthropists. It is to be found 
in the fundamental conception of modern education — ■ 
to fit the child for his life environment. In our high 
schools we are fitting students to enter upon the special 
training required for the higher intellectual walks of life. 
But such students must necessarily be few. The great 
mass of pupils in the elementary schools — and more par- 
ticularly the thousands of over-age children in the grades 
— are not receiving all the training needed to enable them 
to adapt themselves to the environment of modern life. 
They receive good instruction in the essential intellectual 
arts of reading, writing, arithmetic, and drawing, and they 
gain some knowledge of history, civics, and geography. 
But they do not receive sufficient training of the eye and 
the hand, either in school or in their city homes, to fit them 
to enter successfully on the highly specialized activities of 
modern manufacturing. Adequate training of the eye and 
hand in the use of tools and in the manipulation of simple 
machinery — training -that will lay a foundation of manual 
skill for any work that may afterwards be undertaken — is 
the first step toward general industrial education. 

Not the manufacturers and not the philanthropists, but 
the educators, who for twenty years, through good report 
and bad report, through ridicule and "detraction rude," 
have fought for manual training in the schools, are the 
logical advocates, the true pioneers, of industrial education. 

In the public discussions of this subject there has been 
much exhortation, much denunciation, much eloquence, 
but little of practical wisdom or suggestion. One may 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1908 1 19 

search in vain the hundreds of books and pamphlets that 
have poured from the press on this subject, for a working 
plan that will meet the requirements of a great city within 
whose borders there are hundreds of trades, many of which 
the average citizen has never even heard of. In a small 
community in which there are two or three large manufac- 
turing establishments the problem is comparatively easy, 
In such communities the obvious duty of the public schools, 
as far as industrial education is concerned, is to give in- 
struction along those lines which will enable the youth to 
commence intelligently the work of learning one of the 
local trades. Far different is it in New York or any other 
large city in which the trades are infinitely diversified and 
in which some of the largest trades employ for the most 
part unskilled labor. The table on pages 1 20-1 21 presents 
some of New York's most important industries, together 
with the capital invested and the number of wage earners, 
according to the census of 1900. 

The number of wage earners in the industries enumerated 
is, of course, vastly larger now than when the census was 
taken in 1900, but these are the latest figures at hand. At 
any rate, they show very clearly the impossibility under 
existing conditions of attempting, in connection with the 
public schools, to train workmen for all the trades estab- 
lished in New York. The task is too gigantic. The city 
could not afford it. 

Under these conditions the only feasible thing to do is 
to extend the manual training in the schools so as to bring 
all pupils under its beneficent influence, and to make our 
manual training more practical in character so that it may 
afford a more fitting preparation for any manual trade to 



120 



TRADE SCHOOLS 



CHIEF MANUFACTURING INDUSTRIES OF NEW YORK 



Industry 



All industries 

Blacksmithing and wheelvvrighting 

Bookbinding and blank-book making . 

Boots and shoes, factory product . . 

Bread and other bakery products . 

Carpentering 

Carriages and wagons 

Cars and general shop construction 
and repairs by street railroad com- 
panies 

Chemicals 

Clothing, men's, factory product . . 

Clothing, women's, factory product 

Confectionery 

Cooperage 

Cordage and twine 

Electrical apparatus and supplies . . 

Enameling and enameled goods . . 

Engraving, steel, including plate print- 
ing . . . 

Photolithographing and photoengrav- 
ing 

Flouring and grist mill products . 

Foundry and machine shop products . 

Gas, illuminating and heating . . . 

Ironwork, architectural and orna- 
mental 

Jewelry 

Lapidary work 

Liquors, malt 

Lithographing and engraving . . . 

Lumber, planing mill products, includ- 
ing sash, doors, and blinds . . . 



W c/) 

to ti 

o g 


Total Capital 

in Dollars, 

Round Figures 


a w 
t> 

*i 
§ s S 

p 2 < 
< £ w 


39,77 6 


$921,000,000 


462,763 


1,003 


2,000,000 


2,304 


239 


4,000,000 


6,270 


99 


4,000,000 


5430 


1,966 


13,000,000 


10,915 


1,491 


8,000,000 


8,660 


236 


3,000,000 


2,425 


6 


6,000,000 


2,131 


37 


4,000,000 


377 


1,889 


36,000,000 


30,406 


1,607 


27,000,000 


44,7i5 


53o 


6,000,000 


5,536 


90 


3,000,000 


1,902 


11 


6,000,000 


3,252 


104 


8,000,000 


4,768 


21 


2,000,000 


i,45 8 


85 


3,000,000 


1,640 


47 


500,000 


667 


11 


8,000,000 


543 


589 


48,000,000 


19,560 


13 


1 34,000,000 


4,065 


175 


5,000,000 


4,305 


229 


5,000,000 


2,833 


37 


3,000,000 


398 


89 


65,000,000 


4,824 


94 


10,000,000 


5,474 


126 


5,000,000 


3,620 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1908 



121 



CHIEF MANUFACTURING INDUSTRIES OF NEW YORK 

{Continued) 



Industry 


i 
a W 

| % 


Total Capital 

in Dollars, 
Round Figures 


Average Num- 
ber of Wage 
Earners 


Masonry, brick and stone .... 

Musical instruments, pianos and ma- 
terials 


164 

383 
279 

95 
61 

40 

1,608 

996 

4i3 

364 

83 

5° 
12 

821 
32 


$5,000,000 
9,000,000 
4,000,000 

1 1 ,000,000 

10,000,000 

8,000,000 

6,000,000 

19,000,000 

40,000,000 
I,ooo,0OO 
4,000,000 
4,000,000 

62,000,000 

6,000,000 
5,000,000 


3.771 
10,236 

I,78l 

5,664 
1,970 
1,489 
8,149 

12,857 

9,888 

758 
2,484 

981 
3,075 

6,066 
521 




Paving and paving materials .... 
Plumbing and gas and steam fitting . 
Printing and publishing, book and job . 
Printing and publishing, newspapers 

Ship and boat building, wooden . . 

Sugar and molasses, refining . . 
Tinsmithing, coppersmithing, and 
sheet-iron working 





which the child may turn his attention. The policy deter- 
mined upon by your Board is clearly mapped out in the 
report of your Committee on Trade Schools. 

******* 

There are two inferences to be drawn from the report 
adopted by your Board, which I cannot but think will 
commend the scheme to the thinking people of our com- 
munity : — 

1. The Board of Education does not propose to turn 



122 TRADE SCHOOLS 

out " half-baked " journeymen to compete with union labor. 
What it proposes to do is to fit boys and girls more com- 
pletely than they are fitted at present to commence learn- 
ing any trade requiring skill of hand. 

2. The designs of your Board, when carried out, will 
do much to help the vast numbers of over-age children in 
the elementary schools. They now leave school with so 
meager an equipment, that their prospects of rising out of 
the ranks of unskilled labor are almost hopeless. With a 
very slight expenditure of money we might give all of such 
children at least the use of their hands. These are the 
children whom the opening of our workshops and kitchens 
in the afternoons and on Saturday mornings was designed 
to benefit. 

Two things, in addition to the required appropriations, 
seem to me to be necessary to make your scheme a 
success: — 

i. The employment of skilled workmen in our manual 
training and industrial processes. The boy gains respect 
for hand labor, only when he has a master workman to 
imitate. 

2. Some means must be found to secure the active partic- 
ipation of manufacturers and trades unions in our industrial 
work. This participation may take two forms : — 

{a) The organization of committees to advise the educa- 
tional authorities as to the qualifications of teachers and the 
processes to be taught. 

(b) A provision by which boys and girls, between four- 
teen and sixteen, may spend part of their working day in 
school. Our evening trade schools are helping some 
2000 young work men and women to a more scientific 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1908 1 23 

knowledge of the trades in which they are engaged, and 
to an acquaintance with many processes which, in the 
minute subdivision of labor, they cannot find the opportu- 
nity to learn in their employers' shops. But it is only the 
most energetic and capable who are willing to forego the 
evening hours of rest and recreation in order to gain these 
advantages. If the average boy or girl who goes to work 
at fourteen is to profit by what the schools can give him, 
time must be taken, not from his hours of recreation, but 
from his hours of labor, as is done in Germany, where in- 
dustrial training has reached its highest development. 

Manufacturers who up to fifty years ago felt themselves 
responsible the world over for the training of their work- 
men, must not be permitted, under any pretext, to shift 
that burden entirely to the public schools. 



XII 

PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

In 1888, the year after he became Superintendent of Schools in Brooklyn, Dr. 
Maxwell began the campaign, which he has continued ever since, to accelerate 
the promotion and to prevent the retardation of pupils in their way through 
the grades of the elementary schools. In the Annual Report for 1888, he 
presented his first discussion of the evils of retardation, and laid the founda- 
tion for the system of promotion now in use throughout Greater New York. 

— The Editors. 

{From the Brooklyn Report for 1888) 

AGES OF PUPILS IN THE BROOKLYN SCHOOLS IN 1 888 

A STUDY of the statistics 1 of the subject does not, I am 
sorry to say, indicate that the average age of the 
children in the various grades is being reduced ; or, to put 
the matter in another light, that the average time required 
for a child to go through our schools is growing less. 
The number of children above fifteen in the schools has in- 
creased since 1887, while in no grade does the average 
age of the pupils show a decrease. In nearly all the 
grades a slight increase is shown. 

Not only so, but, as may be seen by the following table, 
the average age of the pupils in each of the grammar 
grades has increased since 1883 : — 

1 In the report a table accompanied this study. — The Editors. 

124 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1888 



12 



Grammar Grades 


1883 


1886 


1! 


J87 


1888 


First 1 


15.2 


years 


154 


years 


15-3 


years 


J5-3 


years 


Second 














14.6 


years 


14.7 


years 


14.7 


years 


14.8 


years 


Third . 














14.0 


years 


14.2 


years 


14.2 


years 


14.4 


years 


Fourth 














13-9 


years 


13.8 


years 


13-9 


years 


13-3 


years 


Fifth . 














134 


years 


*3-3 


years 


13-3 


years 


134 


years 


Sixth . 














12.9 


years 


12.9 


years 


12.9 


years 


i3-i 


years 


Seventh 














12.3 


years 


12.5 


years 


12.6 


years 


12.6 


years 


Eighth 














1 1.7 


years 


11.9 


years 


12.1 


years 


12.2 


years 



When we consider that our course of study calls for 
nothing but the elementary parts of an English education ; 
that nominally it requires but seven and a half years to 
complete the course ; that a child beginning at six should 
graduate before reaching fourteen ; that the actual average 
age of graduation is over fifteen ; and that the length of time 
it takes to get through the grammar and primary schools 
has a constant tendency to cause two evils: to prevent 
parents from keeping their children at school throughout 
the full course, and to prevent those who do complete the 
course from pursuing their studies in higher institutions of 
learning; when we consider all these things, we cannot but 
regard this continued advance in the average age of our 
pupils with very serious apprehension. 

In a paper read before the Department of Super- 
intendence of the National Educational Association at 
Washington, President Eliot of Harvard College discussed 
this subject in a manner that is quite as applicable, I re- 
gret to say, to Brooklyn as it is to Boston. He says : — 

In almost all the numerous collections of school statistics which are now 
published in this country, it appears that the various grades contain children 

1 See note, page 12. 



126 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

much too old for them, who have, apparently, been held back. This 
phenomenon seems to be due partly to the ambition of teachers, and partly 
to the caution of parents. To illustrate with a specific case : In the Boston 
primary schools, which are intended for children of five to seven years of 
age inclusive, 44 per cent of all the children, for three years past, were 
over seven; and in the grammar schools of the same city, which are 
intended for children of from eight to thirteen years inclusive, from 20 to 24 
per cent were over thirteen. It has already been mentioned that the 
average age of admission to the Latin School is not eleven years, as indicated 
in the program, but thirteen years; it is really thirteen years and three 
months. For three years past, from one third to one half of the graduating 
classes of the Boston grammar schools have been more than six years in the 
schools, the program calling for but six years. In the Boston primary and 
grammar schools, the tendency is in the wrong direction; that is, in 1887 
there was a larger proportion of pupils over-age than in 1877. The 
ambition of teachers tends to keep children too long in the several 
grades, because they desire to have their pupils appear well at the periodical 
examinations, and also because they like to keep in their classes the bright 
children as aids to the dull ones. The caution of the parents tends to pro- 
duce the same difficulty, because they fear overpressure; not comprehending 
that with children, as with adults, it is not work so much as worry that in- 
jures, or finding that the existing system adds worry to work. The exaggerated 
notion, already referred to, that it is necessary for a child to master one thing 
before he goes to another, is also responsible for the retardation of children 
on their way through the regular course. The result of this retardation is 
that the boy comes too late to the high school or to the Latin School, and 
so fails to complete that higher course if he is going into business, or comes 
too late to college if his education is to be more prolonged. 

It may be said with equal truth, with regard to our sys- 
tem of schools, that the boy comes too late to the Central 
school to complete that higher course if he is going into 
business, or comes too late to college if his education is to 
be more prolonged. Not only so, but he comes too late to 
the First or Second grade to complete an ordinary public 
school education, and leaves school without that minimum 
of knowledge and training which may be considered 
necessary for his welfare and for the welfare of the 
state. 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1888 1 27 

I have already explained some of the causes that go to 
account for the comparative slowness of promotion, such 
as irregularity of attendance, lack of mental power, and the 
like. But, even when due allowance is made for these 
conditions, no satisfactory explanation has been afforded 
of why the average ages of pupils in the various grammar 
grades should be higher now than they were in 1883. 

Various hypotheses may be suggested to explain this ad- 
vance in the average age, caused by what President Eliot 
calls " the retardation of children on their way through the 
regular course." One of these is that there may not be 
room, because of an insufficient number of classes, to pro- 
mote all the children who ought to go forward in the higher 
grades ; another, that there may be more in our course of 
study than can be fairly accomplished in the given time ; 
a third, that, owing to the crowding in the lower primary 
grades, the teachers cannot accomplish the results required 
of them; a fourth, that the work of teaching is not as 
skillfully done as it might be ; a fifth, that some or all 
principals are too strict in their requirements for pro- 
motion. I shall briefly consider each of these hypotheses. 

The first — that there may not be sufficient space in 
rooms occupied by the higher grammar grades to permit 
all who ought to be promoted to move forward — cannot 
be the explanation, because the number of sittings to a 
class exceeds the average number of pupils to a class in 
each of the grammar grades. 

The second hypothesis, that there may be more in our 
course of study than the average pupil can accomplish in 
the given time, cannot be regarded as the true explanation, 
because, if it were, it would produce the same effect in all 



128 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

the schools. That this is not so, a glance at the following 
table, showing the average age for boys and girls of the 
graduates from each of the grammar schools for 1888, will 
at once determine. 

(Here followed an elaborate table, the salient facts of which appear in the 
next paragraph.) 

From this table it will be seen that the average age for 
graduation varies from thirteen years ten months in one 
school to sixteen years five months in another ; and that the 
average age for boys is from half a year to a year lower than 
for girls. Now, if boys can get through the course of 
study in a given time, it is unreasonable to suppose that 
girls cannot do the same ; if the children in one school can 
on an average complete the work at fourteen, it must be 
supposed that in another school they are not less brilliant or 
less industrious, always premising, of course, that they com- 
mence at the same age. The hypothesis, therefore, that the 
"retardation " is caused by the course of study falls to the 
ground. 

It is right to add in this connection, however, that the 
disparity in the ages of graduation is jn part caused by the 
difference in the age of commencing ; as, in some localities, 
children are sent to school at an earlier age than in others. 

I am also of the opinion that in certain respects our 
course of study is too full, and that it might be relieved of 
some superfluous matters with decided gain to the schools. 

The other three hypotheses — the crowding of the lower 
primary grades, the occasional want of skill on the part of 
teachers, and too great strictness in the making of promo- 
tions — contribute each in part to prevent the more rapid 
progress of the pupils. How these causes may be at least 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1888 129 

partially removed will be considered hereafter. Their en- 
tire removal would result in reducing the average age of 
graduation by very nearly a year. The number of pupils 
that would have the advantage of completing the course in 
the grammar schools would probably be nearly doubled ; 
while the course in the Central school might be extended 
to four years — the usual length of the course in other city 
high schools throughout the country. 

HOW PROMOTIONS MAY BE ACCELERATED 

I have pointed out that, as shown by the average age of 
graduation and by the average age of the pupils in the 
various grades, as well as by the percentage of the num- 
ber promoted out of each grade on the average attendance 
in the same, promotions are not yet made as rapidly as the 
interests of the children and the school system require. It 
will not be denied that the child of average ability who 
enters our schools at six should complete the course at 
fourteen. Nor will it be maintained that it is too much to 
expect any teacher to have at least 75 per cent of the pupils 
of her class ready for promotion at the end of each term. 
Yet the average age of graduation is over fifteen, and the 
average of 75 per cent for each of the two terms into which 
the school year is divided has not yet. been reached in any 
grade either in the Central or in the district schools. It is 
not claimed that all the pupils of a class can be made 
ready for promotion ; nor that any pupil who is not reason- 
ably well ready should be promoted. To argue so would 
be to assume that all are fitted by nature to keep step in 
the intellectual march — a preposterous assumption ; but it 
is maintained that, owing to causes, some of which are 



130 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

avoidable and some unavoidable, not all the children that 
should be advanced each term are allowed to go forward. 

The three causes of the "retardation" of pupils — 
crowding in the lower primary grades, the occasional want 
of skill on the part of teachers, and defects in the methods 
of making promotions — can be remedied only by wise 
legislation on the part of your Board. I have pointed out; 
how the first cause may be diminished, if not altogether re- 
moved. It remains to speak of the other two. 

Considering the faithfulness and diligence with which our 
teachers labor, and considering the fact that improvement 
in their work is, as a rule, to be noted from year to year, it 
seems an invidious thing to criticize the results obtained. 
But the criticism is not one either of individual teachers or 
of the teachers as a body. It is rather a criticism of the 
conditions under which they are compelled to labor. 

This criticism might be summed up in the expressions, 
lack of professional training, and lack of experience. 

The greatest obstacle to progress in the public schools 
of Brooklyn is the lack of professional training. In 1887, 
205 new teachers were appointed ; of whom only 45, or 2 1 .4 
per cent, had received professional training. In 1888, 
234 new teachers were appointed ; of whom only 62, or 
26.5 per cent, had received professional training. While 
this vast mass of raw material is year by year poured into 
our schools, while the intellectual and moral training of 
children is confided to persons who have had no adequate 
preparation for such work and who, in the nature of things, 
can have no realizing sense of their responsibility, it is idle to 
expect that progress will be rapid or that it will be even 
certain. The only test it has been found possible to apply 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1888 131 

to candidates for teachers' licenses is the test of scholar- 
ship, and that has been made as high as it is possible to 
maintain consistently with supplying the vacancies in our 
schools. But possession of scholarship, while it is a neces- 
sary condition of teaching, does not necessarily imply the 
ability to teach. For two years after she enters upon her 
work the licentiate is engaged in learning its rudiments ; 
and because she is utterly ignorant of the principles on 
which its rules are founded, she acquires, perhaps through 
ignorance, perhaps through imitation, faulty habits which 
mar all her future career as a teacher and which it is often 
most difficult afterwards to eradicate. And, in the mean- 
time, what of the children under the untrained teacher ? 
They suffer. 

The remedy evidently is the adoption of a rule such as 
is now in force in one or two eastern and nearly all of the 
large western cities, that no one who has not had either a 
professional or a university training should be appointed 
to any position in the public schools. I hope to see the 
day when such a rule will be possible in Brooklyn. As 
yet it is not possible. But this, at least, is possible : the 
extension of the facilities of the Training School and the 
enactment of a rule that its graduates shall be given 
the preference in all new appointments. 

I now come to the second of the criticisms on our 
teaching force — lack of experience. This criticism applies 
chiefly to teachers of the primary grades above the Seventh, 
and the grammar grades below the Fifth. In the excepted 
grades the teachers remain, as a rule, a sufficient length of 
time to acquire a thorough knowledge of the grade work, 
but it is not so in the other grades. The reason is that the 



132 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

schedule of salaries leads to the custom, in my judgment 
altogether vicious, of the so-called promotion of teachers. 
To see how this system works, let us take a typical case. 
Say that a vacancy occurs in the Fifth Grammar grade. 
The teacher of the Sixth Grammar grade is promoted into 
the vacant place, the teacher of the Seventh grade into the 
Sixth, and so on down to the Sixth Primary. 1 Thus, because 
of one vacancy ten classes get ten new teachers, each 
of whom is inexperienced in the new grade work. Before 
another year rolls round the same process occurs again. 
It is probably within the mark to say that each class be- 
tween the Seventh Primary and the Fifth Grammar has 
imposed upon it each succeeding year a new teacher wholly 
inexperienced in the grade work. Can substantial progress 
be reasonably expected while classes are continually kept un- 
der inexperienced teachers — teachers who had no profes- 
sional training before they entered school, and who are not 
allowed to conquer the work of one grade before they are 
advanced to the next ? Can it be hoped that the number of 
children promoted will bear a proper proportion to the 
number in attendance^? 

Nor is this the only bad result of the present system. 
At present teachers are, with rare exceptions, promoted in 
regular order, without regard to the results of their work. 
The consequence is that, as the able and the weak, 
the careful and the indifferent, are promoted alike, the 
stimulus of promotion for merit alone is absent. The 

1 At this time in Brooklyn there were eight grammar grades from the 
Eighth, which was the lowest, to the First, which was the highest ; and seven 
primary grades, from the Seventh, which was the lowest, to the First, which 
was the highest. — The Editors. 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1888 133 

indifferent teacher — fortunately, the number of such is 
not many — naturally argues that, as she will probably be 
promoted in any case, there is no reason why she should 
call her latent energies into play. Our present system thus 
works injustice not only to the pupils who are continually 
kept under inexperienced teachers, but to those teachers 
who have striven earnestly to do their whole duty, while in 
most cases it rewards the stupid and the lazy equally with 
the able and the industrious. 

The system which I have the honor to recommend would 
place all teachers of equal experience, in all grades below 
the Fifth Grammar, on equal pay. A teacher might begin 
her work in any of these grades and would receive an 
annual increment to her salary until the maximum was 
reached. Thus, as all teachers would receive the same pay, 
according to years of experience, it would be possible to 
place each in the grade in which she could render the most 
effective service ; and, as there would be no advantage in 
moving from grade to grade, each teacher would remain 
in her grade long enough to become thoroughly familiar 
with all the details of her work and to make a study of the 
best methods by which it could be accomplished. The five 
highest grades, as their work necessarily involves greater 
difficulties, increasing from the Fifth upwards, should 
command larger salaries ; and teachers for these grades 
might be selected from those below, either by competitive 
examination or according to results of class work. Such 
a system would secure abundant experience on the part of 
the teacher, and would promote only those who deserve pro- 
motion. 

The third cause of the " retardation " of pupils is what 



134 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

I must needs regard as the defective machinery according 
to which promotions are made. The only rule on the 
subject, except in the case of the First Grammar grade, 
is the following : — 

Promotion of pupils shall be based solely on the record of scholarship for 
the term and at examination combined. 

This rule, if properly carried out, probably presents a 
plan for making promotions that is open to as few objec- 
tions as any which can be devised. But unfortunately no 
uniform method is prescribed according to which it is to be 
executed. 

In only 45 of our Jj schools are the teachers required to 
keep regular records of the progress of pupils. And, 
where these records are kept, the system is such as to 
render it, in many cases, useless as a means of determining 
the promotion of pupils. It usually consists of marking 
the number of failures and successes in the recitation of 
lessons prepared at home, and the number of failures and 
successes in the solution of arithmetical problems pro- 
pounded in class. These marks, again, are confused and 
complicated by the marks given for " deportment." Credit 
marks in studies are canceled by " failures " in deportment ; 
so that, if the teacher happens to be depressed in spirits 
or to suffer from a fit of indigestion, or if she happens to 
be one of those who regard the movement of the head, the 
hands, or the feet, from a given position, as a breach of de- 
portment, the brightest or the most diligent child may 
suffer by reason of the teacher's whim. There is reason 
to believe, however, that, even in the schools where class 
records are kept, but little attention is paid to them by the 
principals in making promotions. Virtually, promotions 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1888 1 35 

are still determined in all grades, except the First grammar, 
by the principal's examinations at the close of the term. 

There is no question that is now agitating the minds of 
educators so much as this of the influence of examinations 
on educational work. The objections to the plan of mak- 
ing promotions depend entirely upon stated written ex 
aminations, were never more forcibly set forth than by 
Superintendent White, of Cincinnati, in the following 
language : — 

They (examinations) have perverted the best efforts of teachers, and nar- 
rowed and grooved their instruction ; they have occasioned and made well- 
nigh imperative the use of mechanical and rote methods of teaching ; they 
have occasioned cramming and the most vicious habits of study; they have 
caused much of the overpressure charged upon the schools, some of which 
is real ; they have tempted both teachers and pupils to dishonesty ; and 
last, but not least, they have permitted a mechanical method of school 
supervision. 

It is not asserted that these results, especially in the degree here indi- 
cated, have universally attended the adoption of the "examination system." 
These tendencies have been more or less effectively resisted by superintend- 
ents and teachers, and they have been measurably offset, in some instances, 
by other measures, as the considering of the recitation record of pupils ; 
but the testimony of educators, competent to speak, confirms the writer's 
experience and observation, and inside facts show that the above indict- 
ment of the system, when used for the purposes named, is substantially 
true. In the very nature of things, the coming examination with such con- 
sequences mast largely determine the character of the prior teaching and 
study. Few teachers can resist such an influence, and, in spite of it, teach 
according to their better knowledge and judgment. They cannot feel free 
if they would. The coming ordeal fetters them more or less, whatever may 
be their resolutions, and many teachers submit to it without resistance ; and 
this is sometimes true of teachers who have been specially trained in normal 
schools, and are conscious of the power to do much better work. They shut 
their eyes to the needs of the pupil and put their strength into what will 
"count" in the examination. 

And, again, in writing on the same subject in his last 
report, he says : — 



136 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

In the study and adoption of improved methods, the principal of the 
school must be the leader. If he be not intelligently and heartily enlisted 
in the reforms instituted, the progress of the teachers under his direction 
will be unsatisfactory. The continued use of tests that call for old results 
will keep most teachers in the ruts, and a principal may thus perpetuate in 
his school some of the hindrances of the examination system. 

In Cincinnati the school authorities have gone to the 
opposite extreme. Pupils are promoted on their class 
records, and these records are simply the monthly esti- 
mates of the teachers of the progress of their pupils. 
Examinations for promotion have been abolished except 
in the case of those children whose parents or guardians 
think they have been unfairly dealt with by the teachers. 
Superintendent White, however, remarks that " The suc- 
cess of the estimate plan in Cincinnati is not conclusive 
evidence that it will be equally successful elsewhere. The 
organization and supervision of the Cincinnati schools are 
well adapted to the administration of the system." 

Though I believe that much of what Superintendent 
White charges against the examination system in Cincin- 
nati is also true in Brooklyn, I should hesitate to recom- 
mend the abolition of examinations for promotion for two 
reasons ; one general in its character, the other peculiar 
to our system. In the first place, the objections to the 
examination system are valid, not against all examinations, 
but against examinations improperly conducted. When 
the examiner draws only from a limited stock of knowl- 
edge and consequently repeats his questions again and 
again, he puts a premium on cramming ; when he asks 
for only unimportant details or insists that answers be 
given in the words of the book, he leads to the neglect 
of principles and encourages rote learning ; but, when 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 



137 



examinations are properly conducted, they are indispen- 
sable to the progress of a system of graded schools. Not 
only may they be made the means of preventing cramming 
and rote learning, but of preventing a kind of teaching 
which I cannot help regarding as worse than either cram- 
ming or rote learning — that kind which is so loose and 
desultory as to demoralize the intellectual habits of the 
student. The habit of mind we should aim to cultivate 
is that which in the affairs of life enables a man to see 
clearly the end to be accomplished, and to take with hon- 
esty and firmness of purpose the path that leads most 
directly and easily to its accomplishment. In every branch 
of study the cultivation of this habit is a thing to be kept 
ever in view. . Every time the teacher wanders, or allows 
her pupils to wander, from the straight path that must 
be pursued to master a subject, she encourages the forma- 
tion of habits, to which we are all too prone, that are the 
reverse of those to be desired. Now, it is only teachers 
of the highest order, of whom in the nature of things 
there can be but few, that can, without external influence, 
curb this propensity to wander ; and, as examinations prop- 
erly conducted are the most powerful of these external 
influences, it follows that they should not, as yet, be 
abandoned. 

But even if the theory of dispensing with examinations 
for promotions were the true one, there is still a reason 
why it should not be adopted at present in Brooklyn. 
This reason grows out of the statement already made in 
regard to the " inexperience " of the great majority of our 
teachers. So long as most of our new appointees are 
without professional training, so long as most of our 



138 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

teachers remain but one or two terms in a grade, it would 
be absurd to make their estimates or marks, even if re- 
vised by the principals, the sole basis on which to make 
promotions. 

Neither, on the other hand, should examinations be the 
sole basis. A child may suffer so from nervousness at an 
examination that it cannot do itself justice. A principal 
may ask questions which the teacher has not covered dur- 
ing the term. In neither case should a child be compelled 
to remain a second term in a class, re-learning the same 
facts, reading matter that it already knows by heart, and 
going through exercises that can result only in mental 
nausea. 

The system implied in the rule of the Board already 
quoted is, in my judgment, the best; or at least the best 
for Brooklyn at present. The one thing wanting is a set 
of regulations to govern its execution. 

In the attempt to find a basis or plan for such regula- 
tions, the first question that naturally arises, is : Of what 
shall a pupil's record for the term consist ? Shall it be a 
record of recitations from day to day, modified by deport- 
ment marks, as at present ? To this plan, besides the ob- 
jections already stated, there is one which is to my mind 
conclusive. It may be briefly summed up in the dictum : 
marking and teaching at the same time are incompatible. 
If a teacher gives her whole mind to the work in hand, 
she has no thought to spare for marking. If she subtracts 
from the sum total of her mental energy the amount needed 
to form a judgment during the lesson on the work of each 
individual pupil, the value of her teaching is diminished in 
proportion. The usual plan is to give up a certain amount 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1888 139 

of time to the work of marking. For instance, after a 
problem in arithmetic has been worked, the teacher takes 
whatever time may be necessary to examine and mark the 
answer of each individual pupil. This is almost an utter 
waste of time, yet it appears to be a necessary concomitant 
of the system that requires the marking of each recitation 
made by each pupil. The plan results both in dissipation 
of energy and in waste of time. 

Such a system, moreover, altogether ignores the dif- 
ferent ways in which knowledge is acquired. These, as 
President Hyde, of Bowdoin College, recently pointed out, 
are three : first, apprehension of the lesson as stated in 
the book, or taught by the teacher ; second, application, or 
power to put the knowledge into practice ; and third, com- 
prehension, or grasp of the subject in its important features 
and broad relations. Comprehension is best tested by an 
examination at the end of the term ; though, of course, the 
examination need not be confined altogether to this pur- 
pose. Application can most naturally be tested through 
the class exercises, in composition, in reading, in the solu- 
tion of mathematical problems, and in drawing. Appre- 
hension may be judged by the regular lessons on such 
subjects as history, geography, technical grammar, and 
the principles and rules of arithmetic. There are evidently 
three kinds of minds corresponding to these three ways 
of acquiring knowledge. In the race for promotion each 
kind is entitled to an equal chance. The plodder who 
learns every lesson and every detail correctly, but who is 
slow to grasp a subject as a whole and has little or no 
originality ; the quick, analytic mind that acquires empirical 
knowledge intuitively and applies it readily to the solution 



140 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

of particular problems, but is wanting in breadth and com- 
prehensiveness ; and the broad, logical mind that grasps a 
subject as a whole and easily converts knowledge into 
faculty ; all these different minds should have their specia 
aptitudes considered and should be allowed to advance, as 
far as may be, with equal steps. 

To devise a system of marking that would put on recorc 
at stated intervals the teachers' estimate of the pupils' prog- 
ress in the apprehension and in the application of knowledge 
would not be a matter of great difficulty. Should the 
marks, after being scrutinized and revised at least once a 
month by the principal and his assistants, and averagec 
for the five months of the term, reach a certain standard, 
the pupil should be advanced to the next higher grade, 
even if he made a comparative failure at the final exami- 
nation. On the other hand, even if the record for the term 
were poor, yet if the pupil passed an examination designee 
to test his comprehension of the various subjects as wholes, 
he should also be advanced. Of course, if both the recorc 
for the term and the record for examination were high, 
there would be no doubt about the right to promotion. 
This plan, besides the advantages already noted, would 
have this also in its favor that it would make such subjects 
as drawing and observation lessons, which are now some- 
times slighted by the teachers because they are not examined 
in at the end of the term, count for promotion. 

It is desirable to accomplish two things by promotion : 
first, to advance children as rapidly as is consistent with 
the healthy operation of their intellectual powers ; and 
second, to secure, as nearly as may be, uniformity of 
attainments among the pupils of a class. Neither object 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1889 141 

will be fully accomplished so long as the record of class 
work is kept as it is, or is ignored, and so long as principals 
are permitted to adopt varying standards both as to the 
difficulty of their questions at the final examination and 
the percentage necessary to secure promotion. While one 
principal makes easy questions and allows pupils to pass 
on 70 per cent or even lower, and another gives difficult 
questions and makes 85 per cent the minimum, it is evi- 
dent, especially in a system like ours, in which the primary 
and intermediate schools promote into the grammar, that 
many pupils will be promoted who should not be, that 
many will be held back who should be advanced, that 
classes will not be uniformly graded, and that, in a word, 
the worst abuses of the examination system are likely to 
flourish. 

I have written at some length on this subject because of 
its supreme importance ; and I commend it to your atten- 
tion as one that calls for speedy and careful legislation. 

METHODS OF PROMOTION 

The discussions of retardation and promotion in the Report for 1888, led 
the Brooklyn Board of Education to revise its rules governing the promotion 
of pupils. The irregularities of the method that had theretofore prevailed and 
the main features of the new rules are discussed in the Report for 1889. 

— The Editors. 

(From the Brooklyn Report for i88g) 

The method of promoting in vogue up to the present 
year was practically this : the principal, in whom the power 
was vested, promoted from a given grade the number 
of scholars necessary to fill up the seats in the class 
room or rooms of the next higher grade. If twenty- 



142 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

five pupils were ready for promotion, and if there was 
room in the next higher grade for only ten, ten were pro- 
moted. If there was room for forty, the twenty-five that 
were ready for promotion were promoted, and the full 
quota was made up by promoting fifteen that were not 
ready. This was not the plan in all cases, but there is 
only too good reason to believe that it was the plan in 
most cases where irregularities such as those noted above 
were found. Nor was even this the worst. If, in the 
middle of the term, a class became depleted in numbers, a 
forced promotion was made to fill the seats. During the 
year 1889, no less than 3548 children were sent forward 
by forced promotion. The evils arising from such forced 
promotions are very great. There is, first, the injury to 
the promoted child, in that he is put at higher work before 
he has mastered the lower work, and in that he loses part 
of the work in the class he leaves and part of the work 
in the class he enters. Thus his mind is stunted and its 
growth is distorted. There is, second, the injury to the 
children of the higher grade, whose progress is retarded 
while the teacher endeavors to make up the deficiencies of 
those newly promoted. There is, lastly, the injury done 
to the teachers who either lose their best scholars during 
the term or who are subjected to the worry of trying to 
bring up children who are not ready for the grade work. 
These forced promotions are, with rare exceptions, an un- 
mitigated evil. It is only too evident that they are the 
cause of much of the undue pressure of which we often 
hear complaint, and that they are the fruitful source of 
weakness, inaccuracy, and slovenliness in the scholastic 
attainments of our pupils. A principal that makes, or 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1889 1 43 

permits to be made, such forced promotions, except under 
very rare circumstances, is deserving of the severest cen- 
sure. Yet in a few schools they are made two or three 
times a term. 

Forced promotions are opposed not only to sound edu- 
cational economy, but to the Rules of the Board. The 
rule is explicit : — 

^//promotions shall be made simultaneously throughout all the schools, 
on one day in January or February, and one day in June or July. The day 
in each case shall be designated by the Superintendent of Public Instruction, 
who shall notify each principal at least two weeks in advance of the date fixed. 

It may be said, perhaps, in defense of the principals 
who have violated this rule, that it is of recent adoption 
and that they have not yet learned to deviate from the 
old unwritten law that tolerated all kinds of irregularities. 

It is safe to say that, wherever the promotions from 
any grade or class for a year fall below 120 per cent of 
the average attendance for the year, or below 60 per cent 
of the register at the time of promotion, either the teaching 
has been intolerably bad, or pupils entitled to promotion 
have been held back. It is equally safe to say that, 
wherever the promotions from any grade or class exceed 
200 per cent of the average attendance for the year, there 
have been forced promotions with all their attendant evils. 

And yet circumstances may arise, in which it is not only 
desirable, but necessary to make small promotions during 
the term. 

These circumstances, however, are very exceptional and 
are never sufficient to justify the wholesale promotions 
made by some principals. It would sufficiently provide for 
all such cases were the present rule amended to provide 



144 



PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 



that all promotions should be made on designated days, 
except as specifically authorized by the Superintendent. 

PROMOTION AND THE MARKING SYSTEM 

Much of the injury inflicted on our schools by reckless- 
ness in making promotions has arisen from the want 
of a uniform method of testing the fitness of children to be 
promoted. The Rules provide that promotions shall be 
made on "the record of scholarship for the term and at 
examination combined." But " the record of scholarship 
for the term" was left undefined and the subjects of ex- 
amination were not determined. An inquiry instituted by 
your Superintendent developed the fact that in one third 
of the schools no " record of scholarship for the term " 
was kept, that in some it consisted of marks assigned for 
daily recitations, while in others it represented the results 
of monthly written examinations. In very few cases was 
" the record for the term " given any particular weight in 
making promotions, that being determined, when any basis 
was adopted, by a stated examination at the close of the 
term. This examination was made easy or difficult, accord- 
ing as there appeared to be room to promote few pupils 
or many pupils. 

In an address delivered before the Teachers' Associa- 
tion, your Superintendent endeavored to set forth the evils 
of the old system from a slightly different point of view : — 

The system of marking that has been in vogue is, in my judgment, not 
only opposed theoretically to every sound principle of education, but in 
practice it is a constant obstacle to growth. The system has been to mark 
each child on each day's lessons. Thus if, in a large class, each child was 
given two questions on any given subject and answered both, he received 
ioo per cent ; if he answered only one, he received 50 per cent j if he an- 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1889 I45 

swered neither, he received a mark of failure. Now, it is perfectly patent 
that a child may have a pretty good apprehension of a subject, and still 
miss two questions put to him by his teacher. But this is not the worst. 
Suppose he received 100 per cent for answering two questions, he is liable 
to lose the whole or part of that mark by some breach of what is called 
deportment. And when we consider that there are still a few teachers in 
Brooklyn who regard it as a breach of decorum to move the head, the 
hands, or the feet from certain fixed positions, it is evident that the 
amount of injustice which may be done is simply incalculable. 

But the liability to injustice is not the only objection to the present sys- 
tem. A still more serious fault is, that it tends to foster that worst of all 
methods of teaching, according to which the teacher stands, book in hand, 
before her class, and hears recited the lessons that were learned at home 
over night. Such a system of marking is the fit concomitant of such a 
method of teaching. While teaching consists of loading the memory 
with unassimilated facts, it may be all very well to use a system of mark- 
ing that is capable only of measuring the quantity of facts deposited in 
the memory. But if teaching is to be a part of education ; if its aim is to 
be the training of all powers of the mind ; if children are to cultivate 
apprehension, comprehension, and application ; then surely, we ought to 
have a system of marking that will tell the story of improvement in ap- 
prehension, in comprehension, and in application. 

Happily, we are gradually growing out of the old system of rote learn- 
ing ; and those teachers who have made the greatest advance in this direc- 
tion are those who feel most keenly the incubus of the present marking 
system. The necessity of putting down marks during every lesson not only 
involves a serious loss of time, but it prevents, nay it paralyzes, that glad 
and spontaneous effort on the part of both teachers and pupils which is 
the necessary condition of growth and improvement. 

It may be added that, under the old system, our children 
were subjected to an amount of written examination which, 
there is good reason to believe, exercised, especially in 
the case of very young children, a most baleful influence 
on their physical health, and very seriously interfered 
with the work of teaching. In some schools, particularly 
branch primary schools, where successive examinations 
were conducted at the end of each term by the principal, 
the branch principal, and the head of department, I have 



146 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

found that as many as three out of the ten months 
of the school year were almost wholly given over to 
examinations. 

To remedy these evils the Committee on Studies pro- 
posed and the Board adopted a plan for marking the 
progress of children and determining their right to pro- 
motion, which went into effect on the first of last Septem- 
ber. The essential features of this plan are as follows : — 

1. The teachers' marks are estimates of their pupils' 
progress, subject to revision by the principals, and are not 
the results of the daily marking of recitations or of stated 
examinations. 

2. All pupils that receive certain marks from their 
teachers must be promoted. 

3. Those pupils who do not reach a certain standard 
may be promoted if they pass an examination given by the 
principal. 

4. The principal may require all the pupils of a class 
to take the term examination, or he may exempt those 
whom it is considered expedient to exempt. 

5. Term examinations are confined to the last two 
weeks of the term. 

But one promotion has, as yet, taken place under these 
rules. The results have been, upon the whole, satisfactory. 
The waste of time and energy in useless examination has 
been diminished ; promotions have been made with greater 
regularity; the Superintendent has been enabled to de- 
termine with some degree of accuracy" just where the 
grades of classes ought to be raised or lowered, in order 
to adapt the organizations of the schools to the needs of 
their patrons ; and, lastly, in making their estimates, 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1889 147 

teachers have been compelled to think of the progress 
of individual pupils in a way that is having a most bene- 
ficial effect upon the instruction. 

The good results of this experiment — for it must still be 
regarded as an experiment — have been attained in spite of 
a most determined opposition — an opposition all the more 
formidable because in most cases partially concealed. 
Many teachers are opposed to it simply because it is new 
and requires a mode of teaching and of thinking about their 
pupils quite different from that to which they have been ac- 
customed. Others again are opposed to it because, as they 
are not ashamed to confess, they find it difficult to form 
rational estimates of their pupils' progress. Many princi- 
pals are opposed to it because it takes the absolute power 
of promoting out of their hands, and divides responsibility 
with the class teachers. Still others are opposed to it be- 
cause it deprives them of many opportunities for conduct- 
ing written examinations. 

These forces were all strongly operative at first; but, 
with increased experience, their vitality is decreasing. 
Teachers are beginning to realize that the new system, 
when properly administered, involves very much less labor 
than the old one, and that the responsibility placed upon 
them has added to the dignity and power of their positions. 
Principals, who had not yet learned the lesson, are beginning 
to find out that the chief business of a principal is not to 
sit in his office writing examination questions, but to teach 
and to supervise teaching, and that the chief business 
of teachers is to teach and not to correct examination 
papers. 

Experience has developed several serious defects in the 



148 



PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 



present rules. These will doubtless be remedied by your 
Board in due season. When this is done we may not un- 
reasonably look forward to the cessation at no distant date 
of the evils of excessive examination, of too rapid promo- 
tion, of too slow promotion, and of forced promotions. 

NORMAL AGE IN THE GRADES 

In 1904, Dr. Maxwell returned, in his Greater New York Report, to the 
plan he had followed in Brooklyn from 1887 to 1898, of reporting the ages of 
pupils. He made the important addition, however, of fixing the limits of 
normal age for each grade, so as to determine the proportion of over-age pupils 
in the grades. These limits have now been adopted with practical uniformity 
throughout the United States. This discussion is also noteworthy because its 
immediate result was, within two years, the organization of some hundreds of 
special classes for over-age children. — The Editors. 



(From the Greater New York Report for 1903-1904) 

For a proper understanding of the facts, it is necessary 
to bear in mind that the normal ages of children in the 
several grades, if they enter at six years or six years and a 
half, and are not retarded during their course, are as 
follows : — 



First-year grades . 
Second-year grades 
Third-year grades . 
Fourth-year grades 
Fifth-year grades . 
Sixth-year grades . 
Seventh-year grades 
Eighth-year grades 



6 to 8 years 

7 to 9 years 

8 to 10 years 

9 to 11 years 

10 to 12 years 

11 to 13 years 

12 to 14 years 

13 to 15 years 



The next table shows the number in each year grade 
above the normal age, and the percentage of this number 
on the whole number of children in the grade : — 






GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1903-1904 



149 



Grades 



First year . 
Second year 
Third year 
Fourth year 
Fifth year . 
Sixth year . 
Seventh year 
Eighth year 



Number of 
Pupils 



87,676 
84,254 
82,959 

73M7 
61,666 

45>34i 
3i>94i 

24,220 



491,674 



Number above 
Normal Age 



20,392 
32,141 

374*4 
36,275 
30,226 
19,069 
io,493 
6,133 



192,143 



Per Cent 
of Whole 

Number 



23.2 
38.1 

45-° 
49.2 

49.0 

42.0 

32.8 

25-3 



39-o 



Why, it will be asked, is there such an enormous number 
of children above the normal age in each grade ? Many 
causes doubtless contribute to this most unfortunate result, 
among which may be mentioned the following : — 

1. In well-to-do families there is a constant and, I am 
convinced, a mistaken tendency to keep children from 
school until they are seven or eight years of age. 

2. The large size of our classes, particularly in the 
lower grades, prevents that attention on the part of teachers 
to individual pupils, which is necessary to normal progress 
as well as to individual development, and hence pupils are 
not promoted as rapidly as their best interests demand. 

3. The teaching in the part-time classes is necessarily 
less effective than in full-time classes, and this fact operates 
to retard the promotion of pupils. 

4. The great influx of non-English-speaking foreigners 
every week into our schools introduces into the lower 
grades thousands of children who as a rule are beyond the 
normal age of American children in these grades. 



150 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

The first three causes will be permanently removed only 
by a permanent increase in our school accommodations. 
The fourth cause, which is doubtless the chief cause, may 
be partially removed by better management in the schools. 
If the foreigners above the normal age could be segregated 
in classes in which their attention would be confined 
almost exclusively to the learning of English until they are 
able to enter a grade suitable to their years and attain- 
ments, a great gain would have been made ; the lower 
grades would be relieved, while the foreigners would make 
more rapid progress. A good beginning in this work has 
been made by the Board of Superintendents, which has 
authorized the organization of several such classes. I feel, 
however, that we need a more hearty cooperation on the 
part of the principals in this work. They have been, and 
are still, too much addicted to the practice of placing a 
foreign child who cannot speak English, no matter what 
his age or what his attainments in the schools of his native 
country, in one of the lower grades, and allowing him to 
remain there until he has picked up English without 
special instruction. The results of this policy are most 
disastrous ; the lower grades are congested, and the for- 
eigners who are above the normal age are, in too many 
cases, unable, when they reach the age of fourteen, to 
qualify in school attainments for the certificate necessary 
to enable them to go to work. 

The most important problem of the day in school adminis- 
tration is, how to get the older pupils who are cumbering 
the lower grades into the higher grades. Their presence 
in the lower grades is detrimental to the younger children, 
because they take much of the teachers' time and attention 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1905-1906 151 

that belong to the children of normal age. Their presence 
in the lower grades is detrimental to themselves, because, 
by their position in the school, they do not enjoy the as- 
sociations or receive the instruction their years demand, 
and because, in the majority of cases, they are precluded, 
at the age of fourteen, from qualifying for the Health 
Department certificates which the law exacts as a prelim- 
inary to employment. To the solution of this problem, the 
Board of Superintendents, the district superintendents, 
and the principals must devote their best efforts. 

SPECIAL CLASSES FOR OVER-AGE PUPILS 
( K Fro??i the Greater New York Report for 1903-/906) 

In my Sixth and Seventh Annual Reports, I was obliged 
to call attention to the very large number of children be- 
yond the normal age in each of the grades of the ele- 
mentary school. The number is still very large, but it is 
gradually diminishing. For instance, the total number of 
children in the first, second, third, fourth, fifth, and eighth 
year grades is considerably less than it was a year ago ; 
while there is an increase in the number in the sixth and 
seventh year grades. These facts show that a very deter- 
mined effort is being made by all concerned — district su- 
perintendents, principals, and teachers — to advance the 
over-age pupils as rapidly as possible. These efforts were 
to some extent systematized during the year by the estab- 
lishment of three new grades, in which over-age pupils 
receive special instruction — Grade C for foreign-born chil- 
dren who do not speak the English language ; Grade D for 
children who are approaching the age of fourteen, who have 



152 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

no hope of completing the elementary course, but who de- 
sire to obtain work certificates (issued in accordance with 
the child-labor law) ; and Grade E for children who hope 
to graduate, but who. need special coaching, to enable them 
to enter the seventh grade at the earliest possible moment. 
The instructions to principals are, that pupils are not 
to be detained for a longer period in these special classes, 
than is necessary to enable them to enter the regular 
grades with advantage to themselves. For instance, 
foreign children are kept in Grade C only until they obtain 
some facility in reading, writing, and speaking the English 
language. 

CAUSES OF AND REMEDIES FOR RETARDATION 

{From the Greater New York Report for igog-igid) 

The number of over-age children in the grades is slowly 
but steadily decreasing. The total number of over-age 
children has decreased from 156,208 in 1909 to 146,326 in 
1910, or from 28.4 per cent in 1909 to 26.1 per cent in 
19 10. It is further shown by the fact that the largest per 
cent of over- age children is no longer found in the fifth-year 
grades, but in sixth-year grades, indicating that the means 
adopted to secure the more rapid promotion of the over- 
age children are measurably effective. These means are 
the establishment of continuation classes in the summer 
vacation schools for children not promoted in June, and the 
organization of special classes into which over-age children 
are drafted for a term or two and given special coaching 
to enable them to catch up with the classes to which, by 
reason of physical development, they more nearly belong. 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1909-1910 



153 



There has been, ever since I originated the inquiry into 
the problem of retardation by publishing tables of the ages 
of pupils in the New York schools, much speculation as to 
its causes. As far as the schools of New York City are 
concerned, I have finally settled the question as to the 
chief cause by ascertaining and publishing last year and 
this year the ages of the pupils admitted for the first time, 
to the first-year grades. The chief cause is late entrance 
to school. The following table shows the total number of 
new pupils admitted to the first-year grades, the number 
below seven years of age and the number over seven years 
of age. Six years is the age at which a child may legally 
be admitted to the grades. Seven years is the age at 
which the law requires him to go to school. 

TABLE 





u 
w 

Q 

z 



h 


CO 



h 


O 

H 

CO 




O 
H 



H 




H 

O 


en 

O 
H 

M 


O 

H 

H 


K 
W 
> 

O 


< 

H 


Manhattan . . . 
The Bronx . . . 
Brooklyn .... 
Queens .... 
Richmond 


831 

295 

1,842 

747 
203 


27.3I7 

6,602 

24,445 
4,622 

i,i93 


6,677 
i,453 
5,546 
1,031 
294 


1,635 

422 

1,553 
279 

75 


486 
I50 

544 
75 
27 


!37 

5i 

262 

29 
7 


52 

20 

129 

II 

6 


30 
13 
76 

6 
6 


16 
9 

56 
3 
3 


II 

4 

40 

2 

5 


37»i9 2 

9,019 

34,493 
6,805 
1,819 


Total .... 


3,9^ 


64,179 


15,001 


3,964 


1,282 


486 


218 


13* 


87 


62 


89,328 



Of the 89,328 admitted to school for the first time in 
the first-year grades, 21,231, or nearly 24 per cent, were 
over the compulsory school age, and were from one to 
seven years beyond the age at which children may be 
admitted to the grades. This fact alone accounts for a 



154 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

very large part, indeed the greater part, of the retardation 
shown in the preceding tables. If children do not enter 
school on time, they cannot complete the course on time. 
For retardation caused by late entrance, the school cannot 
bear or assume the responsibility. 

Other causes of retardation there are, however, for which 
the school must accept its share of blame. To determine 
what these causes are and, if possible, to find remedies, 
I appointed eight committees of principals early in the 
school year to study the whole question. 

The eight committees were in substantial accord in stat- 
ing that the following are the chief causes of failure on 
the part of pupils to secure regular promotion from grade 
to grade. The causes, however, are not stated in any 
order of intensity. 

Irregular Attendance, due to poor home condi- 
tions ; looseness of parental control ; ignorance of parents ; 
lack of opportunities for home study ; poverty of home 
requiring pupils' assistance ; sickness of other members of 
the family ; lack of proper clothing; feeble health of in- 
dividual pupils ; poverty of surroundings. 

Truancy, which is attributed by the principals to three 
chief causes : lack of support by the courts in enforcing 
the Compulsory Education Law ; lack of cooperation of 
parents ; and lack of a sufficient number of attendance 
officers. 

Ignorance of the English Language, due to foreign 
birth and to the fact that English is not the language of 
the home. 

Late Entrance into School, due to two causes : the 
presence of immigrant children, and the fact that many 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1909-1910 155 

children are sent to private schools before they enter the 
public schools. 

Transfer from School to School. — Such transfers 
involve loss of time owing to variations in the interpre- 
tation of the course of study and syllabuses, and in 
following different sequences of topics in different 
schools, and frequently to delay in entering school after 
removal from one school district to another school 
district. 

Physical Defects. — These are caused or intensified by 
lack of medical care : nervous troubles ; adenoid growths 
and enlarged tonsils ; defective eyes, ears, and teeth ; mal- 
nutrition ; physical precocity ; lack of play and exercise ; 
unsanitary conditions. 

Sluggish Mentality. — Sometimes this feature takes 
the form of positive mental defect, and sometimes it char- 
acterizes pupils as slow in receptivity and response. Some- 
times it takes the form of moral defects, such as dishonesty, 
lying, and cheating, which are intensified by improper read- 
ing, the following of bad examples, and petty defiance of 
law in the streets. 

Excessive Size of Classes, which prevents teachers 
giving necessary individual instruction. 

Prolonged or Frequent Absences of Teachers, 
during which their classes are taught by substitutes who 
are sometimes indifferent and sometimes inefficient. 

Part Time, which prevents pupils from doing the work 
of the lower grades thoroughly. 

Varying Standards of Rating Pupils. — Some prin- 
cipals and teachers adopt too high a standard ; some too 
low a standard. 



156 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

Inefficient Teaching, due to teachers' talking and 
doing too much for their pupils ; lack of thoroughness ; 
obsolete aims and methods in teaching on the part of some 
of the older teachers ; occasional lack of the power of 
discipline ; neglect of opportunity afforded by the study 
period to teach children how to study. 

Improper Methods of Promotion, due to holding back 
pupils unnecessarily ; not making promotions with sufficient 
frequency ; and to differing standards of promotion. 

The analysis made by these principals of the causes of 
retardation in their various schools showed that the two 
chief factors are personal illness on the part of pupils and 
late entrance into school. 

The remedies suggested by the various committees were 
many and heterogeneous. There seemed to be little agree- 
ment as to what, if any, changes in our system should be 
made in order to eliminate as far as possible the admitted 
evils of retardation. In order to obtain a more definite 
result, I classified the various suggestions and submitted 
them in the form of direct questions to a committee con- 
sisting of the chairmen of the original committees. The 
report of this committee seems so valuable and important 
that I print it in extenso: — 

REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON REMEDIES FOR RETARDATION 

New York, June 24, 19 10. 
Dr. William H. Maxwell, 

City Superintendent of Schools. 
Dear Sir: 

The special committee appointed by you to draft a final report on certain 
matters relating to the problem of retardation as outlined in your letter of 
April 18, 1910, has the honor to submit the following report : — 

I. The advisability of dividing the matter in each subject of study in each 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1909-1910 157 

grade of the public schools into topics to be taken up in the same order 
in all schools. 

The committee is of the opinion that it is not advisable to divide the sub- 
ject matter in each subject of study into topics for uniform adoption by all 
schools. To lessen the amount of retardation that may result from the trans- 
fer of pupils from one school to another, which may be due to variation in 
the teaching plans of the respective schools, it is suggested that principals 
provide for the individual instruction of such pupils when needed, the instruc- 
tion to be given by regular class teachers, by teachers in training, or by the 
pupils' classmates. 

II. The formulation of a plan for a uniform method of rating pupils in 
studies and a uniform standard for promotion. In connection with this topic, 
the question, " What part should examinations play ?" should be considered. 

With regard to that part of the topic dealing with the formulation of a 
plan for a uniform method of rating pupils in studies, the committee 
recommends — 

(1) That a suggestive scheme embodying a uniform method for the rating 
of pupils be devised; 

(2) That such a scheme be offered principals for optional adoption ; 

(3) That the plan be based on a point system; • 

(4) That in the point system adopted each subject of study receive an 
evaluation based on its relative importance in each grade as indicated by the 
course of study. 

With reference to that part of the topic which relates to a uniform standard 
for promotion, the committee recommends — 

(1) That, for the purpose of indicating the standards for promotion that 
should prevail, official suggestions be issued covering the subjects of study of 
the grades; 

(2) That these suggestions be similar in character and scope to the sug- 
gestions contained in the form now used in the 8B grade, entitled " Estimate 
of Graduating Pupils' Attainments"; 

(3) That suggestions thus issued be used solely for the purpose of stand- 
ardizing the work of the grades, and not for the purpose of rendering reports 
of any kind. 

In reply to the question, " What part should examinations play ? " the com- 
mittee recommends — 

(1) That examinations be not imposed upon schools by superintendents as 
testing instruments for promotion or for public comparison ; 

(2) That examinations be not imposed by principals as the chief method 
of determining promotion. 

III. How often should final or general promotions be made ? 

The committee recommends that final or general promotions be made at 



158 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

the end of each term of twenty weeks, and not oftener. In this connection 
the committee suggests that there be submitted for the consideration of prin- 
cipals the question of the feasibility of their organizing some of their regular 
classes at the beginning of the eleventh and thirty-first weeks of the scholastic 
year. These classes are not to be special classes. The only difference be- 
tween them and the present regular classes is that the terms would overlap. 
This plan would afford an opportunity of transferring pupils who are not pro- 
moted at the close of a term to another class ten weeks behind the former 
one. In this way a pupil would lose only ten weeks instead of twenty. This 
plan would also give an opportunity for rapid promotions without the necessity 
of a pupil's skipping an entire grade. With regard to the plan outlined, the 
committee recommends — 

(1) That the plan be submitted to principals for optional adoption ; 

(2) That to render the plan feasible in small mixed schools, proper author- 
ity be delegated to the principals to organize mixed classes wherever such 
classes may be necessitated by the plan of organization. 

IV. What rules should be adopted to determine the number of terms a 
pupil may be held in any one grade ? 

The committee recommends that in general pupils be held in a grade no 
more than two terms, with the proviso that this rule be not construed to apply 
to promotion from the 8B grade under the present course of study. 

V. The advisability of a modified course of study for classes of retarded or 
backward pupils. If any subject should be omitted from the present course 
in such classes, the committee should specify the subject. If parts of subjects 
are to be omitted, the committee should specify which parts. 

In connection with this topic the committee agreed — 

(1) That a modified course of study is advisable for classes of backward or 
retarded pupils; 

(2) That the City Superintendent be informed that the committee is uii" 
able to take action on that part of the topic relating to the subjects and parts 
of subjects to be omitted, owing to the committee's lack of information rela- 
tive to (a) the administration of successful special classes now in operation, 
and (6) the modifications in the course of study which have been made to 
meet the needs of such classes; 

(3) To offer to undertake the preparation of such modified course of 
study when supplied with the aforesaid information: 

(4) That the modifications in the regular course of study necessary to meet 
the needs of retarded or backward pupils should vary with local conditions. 
This would necessitate the preparation of a course sufficiently elastic in character 
to meet the requirements of special classes in the various sections of the city. 

VI. The advisability of organizing special classes for the rapid advance- 
ment of particularly bright pupils. 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1909-1910 159 

The committee recommends that where conditions permit, such classes be 
organized. 

VII. The desirability of making a distinction between the graduates of the 
elementary school who may be admitted to high school and the pupils who 
have passed through all grades without gaining enough proficiency to be en- 
titled to a diploma. 

The committee is of the opinion — 

(1) That it is desirable to make a distinction between the graduates of the 
elementary school who intend to go to high school and those who do not so 
intend; 

(2) That the distinction between the two classes of pupils should be 
formally recognized by a differentiation in the course of study during the 
latter half of the elementary school course; 

(3) That this differentiation in studies should consist of — 

(a) A course of study for those who intend to go to high school or who 
show the requisite ability for high school work; 

(<£) A course of study for those who do not intend to go to high school or 
who do not show the requisite ability for high school work : 

Each division superintendent, assisted by his district superintendents and 
principals, should be permitted to recommend the second course of study to 
the end that it may be adapted to the peculiar needs of the section of the city 
to which it applies; 

(4) That the two courses of study should be so interrelated that transfers 
could be made from one to the other without loss to the pupil. 

VIII. The advisability of employing assistant teachers to coach backward 
pupils. 

The committee is of the opinion that it is not advisable to employ assistant 
teachers to coach backward pupils, by the term "assistant teacher" meaning 
a regularly licensed teacher delegated to take charge of such pupils. The com- 
mittee believes that the special classes now permitted can care for these pupils, 
and that where special classes cannot be organized for lack of room, classes for 
backward pupils could not be organized for the same reason. But the commit- 
tee recommends that the principals be permitted at their discretion to employ 
a teacher receiving substitute's pay to perform such duties as the principal 
may direct in coaching backward pupils or in taking the class of a teacher 
who may herself coach backward pupils of her own grade. 

IX. Should algebra and inventional geometry be eliminated from the course 
of study in the elementary schools ? 

The committee recommends that algebra and geometry be thus eliminated. 
In support of this recommendation the committee submits the following con- 
siderations : — 

(1) The main practical application of the algebra of our present course 



160 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

lies in the solution of the so-called " indirect " cases of arithmetic. But 
these cases are introduced early in the grades, and necessitate no elaborate 
algebraic development for their proper understanding ; 

(2) The inventional geometry of the seventh year is remotely related to a 
few mensuration topics of the 8A grade, and more directly concerned with cer- 
tain constructive principles applicable to shop work. The committee is of the 
opinion that the mensuration topics of the 8A grade are of easy inductive 
illustration when the need therefor arises, without the elaborate introduction 
furnished by the present seventh-year exercises in geometry; and that .the con- 
structive principles needed in the shop are the more readily developed and 
the more understandingly applied if they be taught in the shop when the 
need arises for their use. 

(3) In view of these considerations, it is believed that both algebra and 
geometry would be more profitably studied if deferred until they can be 
intensively studied in the high school. 

The committee further recommends that no new subject be introduced to 
take the place of algebra and geometry in the event of their elimination ; 
and that the 200 minutes per week allotted to mathematics be devoted 
wholly to the present work in arithmetic of the grades concerned. 

X. Should science be eliminated from the seventh and eighth years of the 
elementary schools ? 

The committee recommends that science be retained and suggests that the 
present course in science be revised in order to correlate it more closely with 
the needs and experience of the pupils. 

XI. On the assumption that no matter what arrangements are made with 
regard to promotion; no matter what provision is made for the course of 
study, there will always be some pupils, possibly many pupils, who will not 
work up to the full measure of their ability, the question arises, " How may 
enthusiasm be stimulated and the will to work developed in these indifferent 
pupils ? " 

The committee believes that the schools are now doing much to stimulate 
enthusiasm where enthusiasm would otherwise lag, through the agency of 
the various organized and unorganized activities that are now in operation 
throughout the school system. The value of such activities varies as the prin- 
cipals, teachers, and pupils who are interested therein. In view of these 
facts the committee respectfully states that it has no specific suggestions 
to offer. 

XII. Should foreign languages be eliminated from the course of study of 
the eighth year of the elementary schools ? 

The committee recommends — 

(1) That foreign languages be. eliminated from the present course of study 
of the eighth year of elementary schools; 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1910-1911 161 

(2) That in case foreign languages are eliminated, 120 minutes of the 
time now allotted thereto be assigned to geography, as now obtains in schools 
having no foreign language, and 80 minutes be given to unassigned time. 

Respectfully submitted, 

E. J. Jones, Chairman, 
Geo. B. Germann, Secretary. 

The thanks of the educational authorities and of the 
community are due to the ladies and gentlemen who com- 
posed thsfce committees and who gave their time and 
energy willingly to make the necessary studies. They 
have done, in my judgment, a most valuable piece of work 
that will bear good fruit in the not distant future. 

HELPING BACKWARD PUPILS 
(From the Greater New York Report for igio—ign') 

I have been careful to advise the principals that the 
pressure to secure more generous promotions must not be 
construed to mean that' pupils who are unfitted to do the 
work of the next higher grade are to be promoted. It 
means only that every effort is to be made to render every 
pupil fit for promotion. Schools have been run too exclu- 
sively for the sake of the bright pupils. The dull pupils 
or the apparently dull have been allowed to shift for them- 
selves. The only chance they had was to repeat the work 
of the grade in which they failed, and thus they lost valu- 
able time. This policy must now be changed. The bright 
pupils must not receive less attention. The dull pupils, 
however, must receive much more attention. They must 
not be allowed to fail, if human kindness and teaching skill 
can prevent it. 

In my annual address 1 to the principals delivered at the 

1 Subsequently printed in pamphlet form. — The Editors. 



1 62 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

opening of the schools in September, after dwelling on the 
school conditions that make for " the prevention of retar- 
dation," I spoke as follows on the devices and organization 
plans which I have found most effective ' in helping back- 
ward children and in preventing retardation : — 

" There are certain devices which have been used to help 
the slow or backward children. These generally take the 
form of help to individuals or to a group of backward chil- 
dren. Class teachers meet backward children before nine 
or after three. I am not very fond of that device of meet- 
ing children after three, because the teacher is always tired 
and to the pupil the lesson necessarily savors somewhat of 
punishment. Then, as I have indicated, the brighter children 
are set to helping their duller companions. The objection, 
if there is an objection, is that some children will pretend 
to be dull, while they are simply lazy and bent upon get- 
ting some one else to do their work for them. Sometimes 
the pupil teacher from training school is asked to spend 
her time coaching one group after another of dull pupils in 
any corner of the house that may be available. Again, 
part-time teachers are used to instruct dull pupils during 
their shorter sessions. All of these devices are excellent 
as far as they go, but only upon one condition — that they 
are planned systematically and that the plans are rigorously 
executed. It does little good for a teacher to bring a boy 
for instruction one morning at eight o'clock and then do 
nothing more for him for a week or a fortnight. In fact, 
any school work that is to be effective, just as in the case 
of acquiring a new habit or breaking off an old habit, must 
be done every day. No sporadic efforts will suffice. You 
cannot rouse the dormant faculties of a dull boy or a timid 






GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1910-1911 163 

girl by a half hour's exertion, no matter how strenuous. 
You must keep up your lessons regularly — every day — - 
until the habit of using the brain has been acquired. Then 
and then only will the normal amount of instruction prove 
sufficient. 

" Hence, if you rely upon early morning instruction or 
study in school to bring up your slow or backward children, 
you should adopt some such plan as Superintendent Et- 
tinger worked out when he was principal of Public School 
147, Manhattan : — 

1. The teachers of Grades Five to Eight report the names of pupils who 
are backward in language and number. 

2. Such pupils are furnished with cards and are notified that, if they 
desire to study in the morning before 9 o'clock, they may report at rooms 
designated on cards at 8.15. 

3. Each child's card is punched as he enters the study room by a 
teacher who volunteers to take charge. 

4. At 8.40 the regular teachers visit the rooms to inspect the work 
accomplished and to give assistance and explanations. 

" Dr. Ettinger, who worked out this plan, says that not 
only did it prevent many children from failing, but that 
it developed self-respect and self-confidence in the pupils, 
because they were praised by their teachers for their 
industry. 

" A word of caution, however, is needed here. The 
nervous, highly-strung child, or the child who is physically 
weak, may suffer more than he gains by coming to school 
more than the regular hours. Here common sense guided 
by experience must determine the right thing to do. 

" If you wish to use a pupil teacher to coach backward 
pupils, some such plan as that used by Miss Elmore, in 
Public School 117, Brooklyn, will prove useful. A pupil 



1 64 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

teacher is each day assigned to six or seven different classes, 
on a regular schedule arranged in half-hour periods. Such 
an assignment is continued to the same classes for at least 
two weeks, and longer if necessary. The pupil teacher 
is not given, as is too often the case, the difficult task of 
working with the backward pupils, but conducts, with the 
bright pupils of each class, a lesson which the regular 
teacher has carefully outlined, while the regular teacher 
takes out of the class the few backward pupils for special 
drill in the subjects in which they are deficient. Thus 
it happens that each teacher has half an hour free each 
day for the purpose of helping the backward children. 

" In the same way, if brighter children are to help the 
duller ones, the work must be done systematically and, 
above all, through team work. There should be a commit- 
tee of your brightest arithmeticians, of your best readers, 
of your most expert artists, of your most accomplished 
writers, and the members of each committee should work to- 
gether to help the weaker children. 

" There is one prevalent cause of difficulty in promoting 
that is scarcely referred to in the reports I have read this 
summer, and that is losses caused by the absence of reg- 
ular teachers and the presence of substitutes. Indeed, this 
cause was mentioned, as far as I have seen, by but one 
principal, Mr. Page. He has worked out an ingenious 
plan to prevent these losses, and declares that it has been 
entirely successful. The assistant to principal, he says, 
taught the major subjects personally in classes not under 
the charge of a regular teacher. I see no reason why this 
plan may not be indefinitely extended, so as to minimize 
the great losses that now arise through the prolonged ab- 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1910-1911 165 

sence of regular teachers. When a teacher is absent for 
any length of time, the lessons in the major subjects, such 
as arithmetic, reading, grammar, and language, should be 
given by experienced teachers, while the substitute takes 
the classes of those teachers in less important branches. 

" I was somewhat surprised in reading the accounts of 
what is done to advance backward pupils to find that so 
little stress is laid upon the use of the study hour. It is 
during that hour that the brighter children may best help 
the duller ones. In Miss Blake's school twice a week the 
older girls meet the younger girls in what is known as the 
* family study period.' 'This, we have found,' says Miss 
Blake, ' more helpful than anything else.' 

" There are a few rules which I think should be followed 
in the management of the school study period, if that time 
is not to be largely wasted : — 

1. The teacher should spend the entire time in helping and directing in- 
dividuals. She should divert none of it to reading, or correcting exercises, or 
to clerical work. 

2. There should be no aimless study. Each child should have an assigned 
task. For every child there should be a clearly defined object to be attained 
during the study period, and that object should, as a rule, be sought in the 
subject in which he is most deficient. 

" In arithmetic, for example, he should work out a 
typical example, and write a succinct account of the 
process. 

" In history or geography, he should make an analysis 
of a paragraph or a chapter ; that is, throw its contents, 
briefly stated, into the form of a synoptic table. 

" In grammar, he should write from memory rules or 
definitions, and then compare his version with the text- 
book, or do an exercise in parsing and analysis. 



1 66 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 

3. Invariably have the children use pen or pencil during the study period, 
in carrying out a study task or in putting its results into form. It keeps the 
thoughts from staggering about. It concentrates attention and effort. 

" I am inclined to think, however, that more may be 
accomplished to redeem the backward through the general 
organization of the school than by any other means. 

" There should be rapid advancement classes, the pupils 
of which will cover the work of three grades in a year. 
I have to suggest here two things regarding rapid advance- 
ment classes : — 

1. Rapid advancement classes should be formed by selecting at the begin- 
ning of a term the brightest pupils from all the classes of one of the B grades. 
These pupils should be made to understand that they are given the opportunity 
to do three terms' work, say 2B, 3A, and 3B, in two terms, or one year. 

2. In order to avoid overpressure, a pupil who has spent one year in a 
rapid advancement class should spend the next term at the normal pace in an 
A grade. 

"Where there are not several classes in a grade, the 
same result may be attained by organizing rapid advance- 
ment groups in existing classes. The strongest argument 
in favor of the group system is that it enables the teacher, 
even when there is but one class to a grade, to advance 
pupils according to their ability. 

" I have often spoken to you of these matters before, 
but I wish now to call your attention to two types of or- 
ganization which seem to me of great service in helping 
backward pupils. 

" One of these types I found in Mr. Page's school, Pub- 
lic School J*], Manhattan. This is how Mr. Page describes 
the work of last term : — 

I. Every pupil who fell below during the months of February and March 
was interviewed individually by the principal or assistant to principal, and 
communication was held with the parents of all these pupils. 






GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1910-1911 167 

2. On the 21st of April the school was reorganized. All pupils whose 
promotion was at all doubtful were placed in one class of a grade in which 
an abridged program was put into operation, special instruction being given 
in the major subjects in which individual pupils showed weakness. The in- 
struction was individual in many cases. Pupils were coached to overcome 
their deficiencies. ' The results,' adds Mr. Page, ' have proved the efficiency 
of the plan. The hold-overs have been cut down to at least one half the 
usual number, while many pupils have done the work of two grades in one 
term in the bright class.' 

"The objection to this plan is that with slow pupils some 
parts of the curriculum are omitted. 

"The other type of organization to which I invite your 
attention, I found in Miss Tucker's school, Public School 
163, Manhattan. I describe it briefly in Miss Tucker's own 
words: — 

I. Aim — Twofold 

1st. To assist backward and over-age children towards certain promotion. 
2d. To strengthen every pupil in his or her weakest subject. 



II. Method 

1st. — Classification of Pupils 

At promotion time, pupils promoted to each grade are classified on a basis 
of his or her weakest subject. In grades where there are two classes, the 
classes formed would be graded on the basis of weakness in arithmetic and in 
language. In grades having three classes, classifications would be made on 
the basis of weakness in arithmetic, language, and manual training subjects. 



2d. — Designation of Classes 

The new classes are designated and known as 

4B Arithmetic 

4B Language 

4B Manual Training 

instead of as 4B 1 , 4B 2 , 4B 3 . 



1 68 PROMOTION AND RETARDATION OF PUPILS 



3d. — Explanation to Pupils 

To each class is explained the reason for this designation of that class. To 
every pupil in each class is made clear his or her special deficiency, and the 
opportunity that this class offers to him, or to her, for remedying it, not only 
for this term, but for all time. 



4th. — Assignment of Teachers 

In the term's assignment of teachers, great care is taken to place in charge 
of each specially designated class, a teacher whose special skill of presentation 
lies along the line of the subject for which each class is named. 



5th. — Programs — Assignment of Time to Subjects 

A sufficient amount of time is taken from the unassigned time, to give to 
each specially designated class double time for the study of that subject for 
which that class is named. Thus, in 4B arithmetic, twice the regular time is 
spent upon arithmetic; in 4B language, twice the regular time is spent upon 
language, and so on. 

6th. — Extension of the Plan 

In schools where there are a number of classes to each grade, these double- 
time classes could be formed in every subject. 



III. Advantages 

1st. Every pupil in the school receives double time in his or her weakest 
subject. 

2d. As comparatively few pupils are very deficient in more than two 
subjects, the elimination of one of these deficient subjects practically secures 
every pupil's promotion. 

3d. One term in a double-time language class and one term in a double- 
time arithmetic class often transforms a C or D pupil into an A pupil. 

4th. It saves pupils much loss of time. In one term, a pupil receives the 
same amount of instruction in his or her weakest subject as he would have 
received if he had been left back. Thus the same result is attained, and six 
months are often saved for the pupil. 

5th. It tends to encourage the pupils to exert themselves to remedy 
deficiencies and to make both pupils and parents feel that the school has the 
children's welfare at heart. 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1910-1911 169 

6th. It tends to prevent discouragement among the teachers, by arousing 
their professional enthusiasm, and by preparing them for specialization leading 
to promotion to higher grades. 

7th. It helps prevent truancy by arousing interest. 

" I particularly commend the plan that has been tried 
successfully in Public School 163, Manhattan. It does 
not remove the dull pupils from the inspiring companion- 
ship of brighter pupils. It does not disturb a school by 
frequent reorganizations. It is free from the intricacies 
that too often beset school plans either for succoring the 
backward or rapidly advancing the bright. It has the 
supreme merit of simplicity — the merit that characterizes 
all great inventions." 



XIII 
PHYSICAL TRAINING 

{From the Brooklyn Report for 1888} 

EDUCATION includes, as I have said, physical as well 
as moral and intellectual training. Your rules dp not 
provide for any form of physical training in the public 
schools. In the new buildings the sanitary conditions are 
very good ; in many of the older ones, especially in crowded 
classrooms, they are very bad. But in all, the physical 
health of the children might be improved by appropriate and 
regular exercise. I find that in fifty schools calisthenic 
exercises are practiced with more or less regularity. But 
in the majority of cases this work is so unskillfully done 
as to be practically useless. To give calisthenic exercises 
requires training on the part of the teacher quite as much 
as does the teaching of language or arithmetic. In the 
Training School Lyng's system of Swedish calisthenics is 
taught. Writing of this system Miss Bergman, superin- 
tendent of gymnastics to the London School Board, has 
said : " Lyng's Swedish gymnastics were introduced in the 
London Board schools five years ago. About three hun- 
dred and fifty teachers are trained at present, and about 
twenty thousand girls derive the benefit of their instruction. 
It is a hard task for the human frame to bend over the 
school desk hour after hour. The result of this contrac 

170 






BROOKLYN REPORT, 1889 171 

tion of the muscles of the chest is seen in our schoolgirls, 
who, with few exceptions, are abnormally round-shouldered 
and narrow chested. Another mischief produced by the 
bad position during reading and writing is the different 
position of the shoulders — one generally much higher 
than the other. For these reasons, and for many more, I 
think it indisputable that physical exercises introduced 
between the lessons are a great boon for the growing 
children. I should like them to have about ten minutes' 
practice between each lesson, the room being well venti- 
lated." After enumerating the different movements, the 
writer continues : " After this plan each part of the body 
is exercised, and we see a great difference between the 
girls who take gymnastics and those who do not, and every 
unprejudiced teacher will acknowledge this." 

No careful observer can walk through our schools with- 
out noticing numbers of children — both boys and girls — 
who are " abnormally round-shouldered and narrow-chested." 
In a city where there are so few small parks and where 
schoolhouses are practically unprovided with playgrounds, 
calisthenic exercises cannot be neglected in the schools 
without serious detriment to the rising generation. I rec- 
ommend, therefore, that a competent expert be employed 
to instruct the teachers in giving calisthenic exercises, and 
that such exercises be required in every class at least twice 
per day. 

(From the Brooklyn Report for 1889) 

Writing upon the subject of physical training, I had the 
honor to recommend, in my last report, " That a competent 
expert be employed to instruct the teachers in giving 



172 PHYSICAL TRAINING 

calisthenic exercises ; and that such exercises be required 
in every class at least twice per day." 

At a meeting of the principals held recently under the 
direction of the Superintendent, a report upon this subject 
was presented by Principals Gunnison, Haaren, and 
Murphy. After showing that " all systematic training of 
the body has been neglected or regarded as impracticable" 
in our schools ; that a system of training which leads to 
the development of the intellectual part alone, has a tend- 
ency to produce many forms of disordered muscular action 
such as St. Vitus's dance, grimaces, spasms, convulsions, 
and the like, as well as headaches, nervous exhaustion, and 
mental derangement ; and that the development of mental 
power depends very largely upon proper physical conditions, 
the report makes the following recommendations : — 

1. That steps should be at once taken looking to the 
adoption for our schools, of some plan whereby physical 
training may be given. 

2. That, as in the too crowded classroom, no system 
of physical training can produce satisfactory results, the 
authorities be urged to furnish at the earliest possible mo- 
ment, suitable accommodations, that the limit of attendance 
now fixed by the Board, in the newer school buildings, i.e. 
56 to a class, need not be exceeded in any building. 

3. As the Lyng or Swedish system seems to be best 
adapted for the use of large schools, that some means be 
provided for the fullest examination of the results obtained 
by the system, from those cities where it is in operation ; 
and, if possible, that its leading features be tried, at once, 
in some of the schools of this city. 

4. If, on such investigation and experiment, this system, 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1892 1 73 

or any other of similar character, seems desirable and 
feasible, that a suitable memorial be presented to the Board 
of Education, asking for such appropriation as may be 
necessary to engage an expert teacher to give instruction 
in the subject to the teachers of this city. 

Among the principals, though there were slight differ- 
ences of opinion as to the details of these recommendations, 
there was substantial agreement as to the main principle 
involved. The Lyng system, which may be used without 
apparatus in an ordinary classroom, is taught in the 
Training School with most admirable results, but the great 
majority of our teachers are ignorant of its devices. Hence 
the necessity of employing an expert for at least a brief 
period, say a year, to teach the teachers. It requires con- 
siderable skill and practice to put the Lyng or any other 
system of gymnastics properly into operation. 

The principals and teachers will not wait, however, I 
trust, for the employment of an expert teacher, desirable 
as that would be, nor even for an order from the Board, 
but will proceed without delay to introduce, in their classes, 
whatever calisthenic exercises may appear feasible. A 
rule, however, should be adopted by the Board, requiring 
that at least ten minutes per day be given to physical 
training in grammar grades, and twenty minutes a day in 
primary grades. 

{From the Brooklyn Report for 1892) 

Hitherto, except in a few schools, Brooklyn educators 
have failed to recognize the fact that there are three de- 
partments of education — the moral, the intellectual, and 
the physical. The intellectual side of education has re- 






174 PHYSICAL TRAINING 

ceived the lion's share of attention. The moral side, 
though it has not received the care it deserves, has not been 
wholly neglected. Physical education, however, except in 
a very few places, has been left to take care of itself. 

Only those who have followed the scientific investigations 
of this subject are aware how much evil may result from 
the neglect of physical training in school and the neglect 
of the very simplest precautions. The disclosures made 
by Miss Emily M. Mosher, in the Educational Review for 
November, 1892, regarding the physical evils resulting 
from the habitual postures of school children, came as a 
revelation even to those who have given considerable at- 
tention to the subject. The data and conclusions set forth 
by Miss Mosher ought to be pondered, and her suggestions 
put into practice, by every class teacher. Fortunately we 
have nearly got rid of those dreadful tortures which used 
to be inflicted on children, when they were compelled to 
sit in constrained attitudes for long periods, and when the 
moving of a hand, or a foot, or a head, was regarded as 
worthy of condign punishment. I use the word " nearly " 
advisedly, because, not one week before the present writ- 
ing I visited a school in which I found a " head of depart- 
ment " requiring the children of certain classes to sit dur- 
ing recitation with their arms folded behind their backs. 
When I pointed out the cruelty of this practice, an order 
was given to relieve the children from the attitude criticized, 
but only to have them assume another equally constrained 
and unnatural. At the word of command, the children 
leaned slightly forward, rested their forearms on their 
desks and clasped their hands. This is practically the 
third position described by Miss Mosher, the effects of 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1892 1 75 

which she depicts as follows : " The third position, 
namely, with both arms supported, while it is not especially 
detrimental to health, in time destroys beauty of figure. 
The trunk is, in shape, an inverted pyramid, poised upon a 
pedestal — the pelvis. The arms, attached to its base, act 
as weights, which, by their adjustments, have power to 
bend and mold the pliable, pyramidal trunk almost at will. 
Suspended upon the side line, they balance each other. 
Supported, nay, pushed upward by resting upon chair arms, 
or desk, they elevate the shoulder blades, with which, by 
virtue of their intimate union, they are practically contin- 
uous. The resultant shape betrays the habit." 

Not only should the teacher not require children to as- 
sume abnormal attitudes, but she should be constantly on 
the watch to prevent their assumption. Again, it is the 
duty of the teacher to see that the temperature of the 
room is normal when artificial heat is used, to take care 
that no child's eyes are subjected to strain, and, as far as 
the apparatus at her disposal will permit, to have the 
classroom properly ventilated. 

All this is good as far as it goes. Physical education, how- 
ever, means a great deal more. Physical education means 
exercise adapted to produce certain defined ends. These 
ends are the development of a symmetrical figure, the 
strengthening of particular muscles, the improvement of 
the general health, and the acquisition of grace and activity 
in movement. All of these things are highly desirable and 
must be included in any general scheme of education. 
Your Board has recently taken the first step toward their 
introduction into the Brooklyn school course, by the adop- 
tion for the first time of an amendment to the rules, 



176 PHYSICAL TRAINING 

authorizing the appointment of a director of physical 
culture. 

Physical exercises in school, besides the advantages 
enumerated, have a most important effect in relieving the 
tedium, physical and mental, that results from prolonged 
attention to study. 

SYSTEMATIC WORK IN PHYSICAL TRAINING COMMENCED 

(From the Brooklyn Report for iSgj) 

In September, 1893, systematic work in physical culture 
was commenced in all the classes of the public schools. 
Your Board was most fortunate in obtaining as director of 
this work a person so well qualified as Miss Jessie H. 
Bancroft. As instructor in gymnastics in the Normal Col- 
lege, New York, and in other places, she had demonstrated 
her efficiency before she entered on her work in Brooklyn. 
Since she assumed her duties here, she has proved herself 
not only a master of school gymnastics in all its phases, 
but also tactful, versatile, full of resource, and a teacher in 
the best sense of that word. 

The system of gymnastics which she employs is for the 
most part German, with some modification from the Swed- 
ish system in the progression and arrangement of the 
exercises to insure the best physiological results. 

The plan under which the physical culture exercises 
were introduced, is this : each principal was asked to desig- 
nate one or two heads of departments who should receive 
instruction directly from Miss Bancroft at stated times, 
drill the teachers in the exercises, and supervise the work 
throughout the school. As there are over 2000 class 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1893 1 77 

teachers, it is obviously impossible that one person should 
personally instruct all of them. The plan adopted is, 
under the conditions, the only feasible plan. It has worked 
better than could have been anticipated and has resulted 
in a very large measure of success. Some defects, how- 
ever, have been discovered. They are not inherent in the 
scheme, but have been developed through the manner in 
which it has been administered in the schools. Miss 
Bancroft has alluded to them in her report, but, for the 
sake of definiteness, I restate them categorically : — 

1. While the majority of the heads of departments have 
taken up the work enthusiastically and performed the 
duties assigned to them with great efficiency, their efforts 
have been in most schools confined, not, I believe, through 
any fault of theirs, to the primary and intermediate 
grades. 

2. While in some schools the original intent of the plan 
— that one head of department or, at the outside, two heads 
of department, should have charge of the work through- 
out an entire building — has been fully carried out, yet in 
most schools the principals have not permitted heads of 
department to supervise the work in the classes under 
their (the principals') immediate direction. As but few of 
the principals have taken pains to make themselves experts 
in the exercises, it is evident that the classes in question 
are bound to suffer. 

These defects are not stated in any spirit of faultfinding, 
but with the hope that the statement itself will be sufficient 
to secure their removal. As Miss Bancroft has shown, in 
three fourths of the classes she has examined, the results" 
are all that could be expected. Poor work is the excep- 



178 PHYSICAL TRAINING 

tion. Were the original plan carried out in all schools, 
poor work would rapidly disappear. It is not too much to 
ask that the principals should resolutely set themselves to 
rid their schools of the defects that have been discovered. 

The benefits arising from the physical culture exercises 
are already apparent. They are overcoming slight tenden- 
cies to deformity, which, when allowed to go unchecked, 
develop into permanent malformations. They are develop- 
ing muscular activity. They are improving the carriage. 
They are teaching children how to breathe ; correct breath- 
ing is essential to good reading as well as to good health. 
They refresh the mind when wearied with ordinary school 
tasks. They cultivate the power of attention, they pro- 
mote good order, and they stimulate the teachers to look 
after the hygienic conditions of their rooms. The in- 
troduction of systematic physical culture has been one 
of the most useful steps taken by your Board in many 
years. 

The spot in which we are weakest in this work is the 
Girls' High School. In that school there is no gymna- 
sium ; there is no teacher of gymnastics. I most earnestly 
recommend that immediate steps be taken to provide 
gymnastic instruction for the young women of the High 
School. 

The same recommendation holds good for the Boys' High 
School. A great interest in athletic games — perhaps too 
great an interest — has been developed among the students. 
But, as in all cases of this kind, the number of those who 
participate in the training required to engage in competi- 
tive athletic sports, is comparatively small. Athletic sports, 
as a rule, attract only those who are sturdy and rugged in 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1893 1 79 

physique. The boys who need physical culture most, do 
not receive it. What is required is systematic physical 
training for all the boys in this school. 

Note. — For the further promotion of the physical and moral development 
of school children in both high and elementary schools, Dr. Luther H. Gulick, 
Director of Physical Training, Gen. George W. Wingate, Commissioner James 
E. Sullivan, and Dr. Maxwell, with several others, established in 1903 the 
Public Schools Athletic League. This League, though outside the direct 
control of the Board of Education, has to do solely with athletics of public 
school children and aims to develop the children not only physically, but also 
morally, in that it tends to take the interest of children from street gangs 
and turn it in right directions. One of its chief aims is to encourage all boys 
and all girls to engage in athletic sports. See the City Superintendent's Re- 
port for 1904. — The Editors. 



XIV 

HYGIENIC CONDITION OF SCHOOL 
BUILDINGS 

{From the Brooklyn Report for 1893) 

IN all that makes for the health and comfort of pupils 
and teachers, our new buildings are a great improve- 
ment over those constructed up to ten years ago. Though, 
as already pointed out, many of the worst rooms are no 
longer used, yet there still remain in old buildings many 
rooms in which the hygienic conditions are deplorable. 
The rooms referred to are too small, or have insufficient 
light, or are badly ventilated. Another defect in nearly all 
our old buildings, and in some of the new ones, is that the 
children's outer garments are placed in wardrobes behind 
the blackboards in the classrooms. There is no need to 
dwell on the menace to health involved in these conditions. 
Where the physical well-being and the intellectual advance- 
ment of the rising generation are concerned, any reasonable 
expenditure to eliminate sources of discomfort and possibly 
of disease would be justified. I most earnestly recommend 
that your Board urge the city authorities to set apart a 
sufficient amount of money to put our old buildings into 
proper hygienic .condition. 

Even in our new buildings it is not by any means certain 
that the system of ventilation in use is the best which 

180 



BROOKLYN REPORT, 1893 181 

modern science has devised. The subject deserves much 
more thorough study than it has yet received. 

The matter of furniture also deserves careful attention. 
It is of the first importance, for intellectual as well as for 
physical purposes, that each child should occupy a seat and 
a desk exactly suited to his stature. If a child is compelled 
to occupy for five hours every day a seat or a desk that is 
too high or too low, the result may be most disastrous. 
Discomfort will certainly produce weariness, mind wander- 
ing, and inattention. It may, and probably will, result in 
curvature of the spine and elevation of one of the shoul- 
ders. 

The plan thus far adopted is this : a mean height of seat 
and desk is fixed for each grade. The majority of the 
desks in each room are of this mean height. One row 
higher than the mean, and one row lower, are also provided. 
When we remember, however, that the ages of the children 
in each grade vary by four years, and that there is a varia- 
tion of from three to six inches in their heights, it will be 
at once apparent that the provision for variation in the 
height of seats and desks is quite insufficient. 

Candor also compels me to state that in many instances 
both principals and teachers have been somewhat careless 
in taking advantage even of the variations in seating that 
are now supplied. Principals sometimes do not place 
classes in rooms seated for the grades to which the classes 
belong. Teachers are often not careful to seat the taller 
children in the higher seats. 

A distinguished scientist has laid down the following 
rule with regard to the seating of school children : " The 
height of the seat should permit easy contact of the whole 



1 82 HYGIENIC CONDITION OF SCHOOL BUILDINGS 

sole of the foot with the floor when the child sits well back 
in the seat, the leg and the thigh being almost at right 
angles. The surface of the desk should be far enough 
above the seat to allow the bent elbow to touch it without 
elevating the shoulder or tilting the body when the hand 
is raised to write." 

While these conditions cannot be realized in all cases at 
present, they might be much more nearly realized by the 
exercise of a little more care on the part of principals and 
teachers. 

The only complete remedy would be the use of adjust- 
able seats and desks, and this I most earnestly recommend. 
Principals and teachers should be held to a strict account- 
ability for the proper use of furniture. The matter is one 
of supreme importance. 

Note. — Since this article was written, Dr. Maxwell has strenuously advocated 
seats and desks that are not only adjustable but movable. — The Editors. 



XV 
MEDICAL OFFICERS 

{From the Greater New York Report for i8gg) 

IN the preceding pages I have spoken of medical officers. 
Such officers are not employed either by the Board of 
Education or any of the school boards. I believe, how- 
ever that they are necessary to the successful administra- 
tion of a large system of schools. The duties assigned to 
them might be as follows : — 

I. The physical examination of all candidates for teach- 
ers' licenses. Such examinations are now conducted by 
physicians whose fees for examinations are paid by the 
Board of Education. At present only those candidates 
who pass the scholastic and professional examinations are 
certified to the physicians for physical examinations. As 
many of the candidates live at a distance, they are put to 
great inconvenience and expense in coming to the physical 
examinations, while most vexatious delays are often caused 
in preparing eligible lists through the failure of candidates 
to respond promptly to the summons for medical examina- 
tion. If the Board employed medical officers who gave 
their whole time to their duties, it would be possible to 
have all candidates physically examined at the time they 
take the scholastic and professional examinations, and thus 

183 



184 MEDICAL OFFICERS 

avoid inconvenience and expense to the candidates and 
delay in preparing eligible lists. 

2. The examination of children reported by principals 
and class teachers as physically or mentally defective. 
The importance of this work has been pointed out in the 
preceding pages. 

3. The inspection of the sanitary arrangements of schools 
and of the work of janitors in cleaning and disinfecting. 

4. The inspection of schools with a view to discover 
those children who are suffering from overwork and need 
to have school tasks lightened, or who by reason of defec- 
tive sight or hearing are unable to do their school work 
properly, but may have their physical defects remedied by 
special medical treatment. 

The money now paid in fees to physicians who examine 
candidates for teachers' licenses Would go a long way in 
paying the salaries of such medical officers. There cannot 
be the slightest doubt that the work I have indicated, if 
performed by skillful physicians, would increase the effi- 
ciency of the schools, improve the physique of the rising 
generation, and by so much increase the sum of human 
happiness. 

Note. — The immediate effect of this recommendation was the appointment 
of two physicians to examine candidates for teachers' licenses. — The Editors. 



D 



XVI 
THE HEALTH OF SCHOOL CHILDREN 

(From the Greater New York Report for igo6) 

R. GULICK, Director of Physical Training, makes a 
valuable contribution in his report to the history of 
physical training in this city. He describes in detail the 
various agencies at work to preserve and improve the health 
of the children in the public schools. 

The first of these agencies is inspection by the Depart- 
ment of Health to prevent the spread of contagious disease. 

The second is examination by the physicians of the 
Health Department to discover physical defects, other than 
contagious disease, which retard the pupil's progress. The 
most important of these physical troubles are ocular de- 
fects and defects of the nose and throat. It is not encour- 
aging to learn that 30 per cent of all the children in the 
schools are suffering from ocular defects. No trustworthy 
estimate has yet been made of the number of children suf- 
fering from nose and throat troubles, but the number must 
be very large. While the Department of Health has been 
singularly successful in stamping out contagious disease 
among school children, and in shortening the time, through 
the employment of school nurses, during which children 
are compelled to be absent from school by reason of con- 
tagious disease, its work is rendered less useful than it 

1S5 



1 86 THE HEALTH OF SCHOOL CHILDREN 

otherwise would be, by lack of means and authority to treat 
other physical defects. All that can be done is to notify 
parents of the trouble. Many parents are grateful for the 
suggestions made and lose no time in putting them into exe- 
cution either through the family physician or through a 
dispensary. There is a large residuum of cases, however, 
where the parents are either too poor or too indifferent to 
have their children receive the medical or surgical treatment 
they require. Take the matter of ocular defects. A child 
is found suffering from myopia. He cannot see the black- 
board. He cannot see clearly the words on the printed 
page. He cannot see lines and names on a map. He is 
set down as incorrigibly stupid. Yet all that he needs is a 
pair of properly adjusted eyeglasses. His parents are noti- 
fied. If they are indifferent or too poor, the child will 
continue to suffer and to lose his chance of success in life, 
unless a kindly teacher takes pity on him and procures the 
necessary glasses at her own expense. Principals and teach- 
ers have done this noble charity in many instances. Indeed, 
I know of a school where, largely through the munificence 
of principal and teachers, a small permanent fund has been 
established for the purpose of providing poor children with 
glasses. Yet there are still thousands of children who are 
suffering through lack of attention to their eyes. It would 
seem that eyeglasses ought to be provided by the Board 
of Education for children who need them and whose par- 
ents are unable to provide them. A matter of such vital 
importance to the training of the future citizen should not 
be left to private charity or to neglect. It is surely poor 
economy to provide, at the public expense, books and maps 
and stationery for a child whose vision is defective, if at the 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1906 187 

same time you do not furnish him with the means of using 
them. 

Throat and nose troubles are more easily attended to 
than eye troubles, because their cure, as a rule, requires 
only a very slight surgical operation. Yet even here parents 
frequently show an indifference that is astounding. In one 
school last spring out of one hundred and fifty cases of 
adenoid growths in the throat, the parents of over seventy 
of these afflicted children would do nothing to procure them 
relief. True, they gave their consent to have the necessary 
operations performed in school by a prominent surgeon 
attached to a large hospital who kindly volunteered for the 
work; but a few days afterwards when the Health Depart- 
ment physicians visited a neighboring school solely for the 
purpose of making an inspection, the school was mobbed 
by a crowd of ignorant and misguided mothers, among 
whom the malevolent report had been spread that the 
doctors were going to cut the throats of the children. I 
mention this extraordinary incident to show how difficult it 
is to overcome the prejudice and indifference of ignorant 
parents when the health of their children is at stake. 
At present, our only recourse is for the principals and 
teachers to endeavor to persuade parents to permit the 
necessary operations to be performed. The city hospitals 
are most generous in caring for children sent to them from 
the public schools, when the parents are too poor to have 
them treated at their own expense. 

The positive agencies for promoting the health and 
developing the strength of our children are the regular 
physical training exercises, the work of the vacation play- 
grounds and recreation centers, and the promotion of 



1 88 THE HEALTH OF SCHOOL CHILDREN 

athletic sports for boys and more recently for girls through 
the Public Schools Athletic League. Unfortunately only 
83 schoolhouses out of over 500 are as yet provided with 
gymnasiums, so that this important work is not perfectly 
carried out. 

The more that questions regarding the health of the 
children in the public schools are studied, the more forcibly 
I believe it will be brought home to us that the chief cause 
of poor health and retarded development, next to heredity, 
is malnutrition. It is not so much that the children of the 
tenement house have not sufficient food, but that their food 
is often badly cooked or is of such a character that it does not 
afford the requisite sustenance, or that their teeth are in 
such condition as to prevent adequate digestion. Mal- 
nutrition is the chief cause, not only of physical weakness, 
but of mental weakness, and is no doubt largely responsible 
for the dreadful ravages made by the various forms of 
tuberculosis. A badly nourished body furnishes a poor 
support for intellectual effort and, instead of being a barrier 
against, is a standing invitation to, disease. The Board of 
Education may do more to promote the health of our 
children by providing a simple, wholesome mid-day meal at 
a cost which even the poorest could afford, than by any 
other means within its power. I urgently recommend that 
steps be taken to provide cheap luncheons in all our schools. 



XVII 
A DEPARTMENT OF SCHOOL HYGIENE 

{From the Greater New York Report for igoy) 

I RECOMMEND as the most important and necessary 
work to be accomplished at present by your Board 
the establishment, under your direction, of a Department 
of School Hygiene. Such a department should be under 
the direction of a capable medical officer who should have 
the rank and salary of an Associate City Superintendent. 
He should have a sufficient number of qualified physicians 
as his assistants, to examine, physically, all the children 
in the public schools at least once a year, and a sufficient 
number of nurses to visit the homes of sick children and 
to care for slight ailments in school. Such a department 
should be furnished with a medical library, containing all 
important literature on the subject of school hygiene whether 
published in this country or abroad. It should also be 
supplied with all the requisite apparatus and instruments 
for making physical examinations and anthropometric 
investigations. 

Further, in case existing laws are not sufficient for the 
purpose, an amendment to the charter or to the penal code 
should be sought that would make it obligatory upon 
parents and guardians to place children, for whom they 
are responsible, in proper condition, as far as such condition 

189 



190 A DEPARTMENT OF SCHOOL HYGIENE 

may be attained by medical or surgical attention, to profit 
by the education given in the schools. 

It should also be made the duty of the medical officer 
of the Board to prosecute, in court, all parents and guardians 
who fail in this duty of providing needed medical or surgi- 
cal treatment for their children. 

The chief reasons for the establishment of a Department 
of Hygiene with the powers and duties described above, 
are the following: — 

1. The conditions of modern city life and 'of modern 
school life tend to produce physical defects and diseases 
in children which, unless remedied at the start, retard their 
progress in school and diminish their usefulness and hap- 
piness in after life. 

2. Medical and surgical knowledge has reached a per- 
fection which enables its practitioners to cooperate in the 
education of children in a way and to a degree never be- 
fore possible. 

3. Teachers stand in constant need of the skilled phy- 
sician's advice in the treatment and training of children. 

4. The influence of such a department is needed, in 
addition to the influence of the teachers, to give to our 
enormous alien population new ideals and new habits in 
the rearing of children and to establish among them Ameri- 
can standards of living. 

5. The establishment of a Department of Hygiene 
would be both a direct and an indirect saving in financial 
expenditure. 

6. The present arrangements for the physical examina- 
tion of school children through doctors employed for the 
purpose by the Department of Health have been inade- 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 1 9 1 

quate and have not been attended with the desired 
results. 

A few words are added in explanation of each of these 
six reasons for the establishment of a Department of 
Hygiene under the direction of the Board of Education. 

1. The conditions of modern city life which tend to pro- 
duce physical defects in children are : Lack of exercise, 
city children seldom having to walk more than two or three 
blocks to school and having little work to perform about 
the home that would develop the muscles and breathing 
capacity ; crowding in poorly lighted and poorly ventilated 
apartments, which results in various forms of tubercu- 
losis ; lack of space for free play ; lack of interesting 
occupation outside of school hours ; excessive noise (New 
York in its crowded parts being probably the noisiest city 
on the globe) ; lack of sufficient sleep, owing to noise and 
excitement; insufficient or unwise feeding, tea or coffee 
and bread being the principal articles of diet in the tene- 
ment house ; uncleanly habits of person, owing to lack of 
bathing facilities and to lack of knowledge of the need for 
soap and water. These conditions tend to produce various 
forms of nervousness, lowered vitality, defective eyesight, 
defective teeth, and probably those growths in the nose 
and throat which restrict respiration and drive the child 
into reckless mischief and defiance of authority. Hygienic 
conditions in the school, though better even in the oldest 
and poorest school building than in the average tenement, 
have not tended to alleviate troubles generated in the 
home and in the street, and in some cases even tend to 
augment them. The crowding in the tenements has led 
to the erection of enormous school buildings, which are 



192 A DEPARTMENT OF SCHOOL HYGIENE 

also crowded, for in no other way can children in the con- 
gested neighborhoods receive the benefits of education. 
Sitting several hours a day at a desk which may not be 
hygienically constructed, increases such diseases as curva- 
ture of the spine, and often produces faults of posture 
which the physical exercises of the classroom and the 
gymnasium barely avail to counteract. Defects in eye- 
sight are certainly aggravated, as will presently be shown, 
by the work of the classroom. In short, though the 
school is doing what it may with its present resources — 
by physical training, by games, by athletic sports, by the 
maintenance of recreation centers* — to neutralize the evil 
effects of urban life upon children ; yet these resources 
are inadequate because they do little or nothing for those 
children who are suffering from a physical defect. They 
are admirable and necessary for those children who are 
naturally healthy and vigorous ; but what a farce it is to 
urge the boy who is weak through the insufficiency or un- 
fitness of his food, or who cannot breathe properly because 
of adenoid growths in his throat, to go in for relay racing 
or cross-country running ! Almost as great a farce as to 
expect the boy with adenoid growths in his throat to behave 
decently, or to expect the boy who cannot see, to read without 
the aid of glasses what is printed in his book or written on 
the blackboard. The conclusion is inevitable ; the urban 
school can do but little for the child suffering from physical 
defects or weakness engendered by modern urban life until 
the defects are removed or the weakness strengthened; 
therefore its resources should be augmented by the establish- 
ment of a Department of Hygiene vested with power to dis- 
cover physical defects in children and to compel parents 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 1 93 

and guardians to apply the proper remedies when they will 
not do it of their own accord. 

2. That medical and surgical knowledge has reached a 
perfection which enables its practitioners to cooperate in 
the education of children, is a fact not recognized by the 
general public, but nevertheless true. It is only within the 
past generation that medical science discovered the laws 
according to which babies should be fed and tended. It is 
only during the past generation that preventive medicine, 
formerly employed only against smallpox, typhus, and 
plague, has been extended to combat malaria, yellow fever, 
and tuberculosis. In olden times the province of the 
physician was generally regarded as confined to the treat- 
ment of the sick ; to-day that province has been extended to 
include those measures which are necessary to prevent those 
who are well from becoming sick arid to remove the seeds 
of disease. Modern science enables the physician to play 
an important part in the school education of children which 
a generation ago would have been impossible. Some of the 
problems which the physician, equipped with the resources 
of modern science, may help us to solve are the following: — 

(a) Problems of posture. — The physician is needed in 
the school to advise as to the best methods of counteracting 
bad habits of posture that lead to malpositions of the spine 
with resulting interference with respiration, circulation, 
and digestion — results which, under existing conditions, 
seem inseparable from long hours of sitting. His advice 
is needed to determine in a general way the kind of furni- 
ture to be used, but more particularly and urgently how 
individual cases of spine malposition may be corrected or 
at least kept from growing worse. 



194 A DEPARTMENT OF SCHOOL HYGIENE 

($) Problems of vision. — There are thousands of chil- 
dren in the schools who cannot profit by the school work 
because of defective eyesight. Reports from the Depart- 
ment of Health seem to indicate that 6 or 7 per cent 
of the children who enter the lowest grade suffer from 
some kind of defective vision. As children progress 
from grade to grade the proportion of them who are so 
affected constantly increases, until in the highest grade it 
is estimated that not less than 40 per cent are afflicted 
with some form of eye trouble. Is this increase in the 
number of children with defective eyesight, as they advance 
through the grades, caused, even partially, by conditions of 
work in school ? If so — and it seems difficult to resist 
the conclusion — we need medical advice not only to deter- 
mine the way in which individual defects should be cor- 
rected, but also to improve the hygienic conditions of the 
school — lighting, color of walls, color of writing paper, 
and size and shape of print — which may or do accelerate 
diseases of the eye. 

(c) Problems of nose and throat.' — These troubles 
are constantly on the increase. Only in a small percent- 
age of cases are they, though easily corrected, removed. 
Scarcely any progress has been made in the discovery of 
the cause of these troubles, and yet they do more than any 
other physical trouble, except defective eyesight, to retard 
the progress of children in school. There are nose and 
throat specialists in abundance, but none who has made 
an exhaustive study of the specific conditions found in the 
schoolroom and yard. 

(d) Problems of nutrition and growth. — There is a well- 
founded belief, after all ,due allowance has been made for 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 1 95 

sentimental exaggeration, that there are many children who 
fail to profit, either in whole or in part, by their education, 
because their bodies are not nourished. Even if the Board 
of Education should, as I trust it will sooner or later, 
provide at cost price a wholesome mid-day meal in all 
schools, the problem of instructing parents in the feeding 
of children would still remain. This can be accomplished 
only through a well-organized corps of medical experts and 
nurses. 

3. A Department of Hygiene is necessary because 
teachers stand in constant need of the skilled physician's 
advice in the treatment and training of children. Partic- 
ularly is this so in the case of nervous disturbances to 
which, as we all know, city children, because of the condi- 
tions of urban life, are peculiarly liable. Nervous troubles 
frequently beset the child and prevent his getting the full 
advantage of education, and if unchecked, or if aggravated 
by school work, may have serious consequences in adult 
life. The teacher should not be required to shoulder all 
of this responsibility. He is entitled to expert advice that 
will guide him in managing the child's school work so that 
it shall not augment, if it does not remove, the physical 
trouble. Again, the whole question of school work as it 
stands related to fatigue, calls for the counsel of the medical 
expert. Some children are so constituted as to stand with- 
out injury five hours of work in school and one or two 
hours out of school. For other children this amount of 
work is ruinous — it is simply the beginning of that long 
disease, their life. Questions of this kind — questions 
which involve more of medical skill than of pedagogical 
knowledge — can be conclusively settled only by a trained 



196 A DEPARTMENT OF SCHOOL HYGIENE 

medical expert after consultation with a skilled and experi- 
enced teacher. They certainly ought not to be, indeed 
they cannot be, settled by the teacher alone. In the 
families of the rich these questions are settled — at least 
sometimes — by the family physician ; but we have to deal 
with tens of thousands of families that have no family 
physician and little sense of the physical dangers of child- 
hood or the duties of parents. In order to enable the 
child of the poor man and the child of the neglectful rich 
man to have equal opportunities, as far as education goes, 
with the child of the duty-understanding, and the duty- 
obeying, well-to-do parent, the Board of Education should 
provide that expert medical advice regarding the school 
work of children of which every teacher stands in need. 

4. The influence of such a department is needed, in 
addition to the influence of the teachers, to give to our 
enormous alien population new ideals and new habits in 
the rearing of children and in establishing among them 
American standards of living. It is generally admitted 
that the public school is the most potent influence we pos- 
sess in converting the vast hordes of foreigners who 
annually come to our shores into self-respecting, self-sup- 
porting American citizens. I would be the last to mini- 
mize or disparage this influence. It has wrought wonders 
in training children to intelligence, efficiency, and civic 
duty. Even in this very matter of establishing higher 
standards of living, the modern school, with its example 
of good housekeeping, with its orderly arrangement, with 
its lessons in sewing and cooking for girls and in manual 
training for boys, to say nothing of the other subjects in 
the curriculum, has accomplished very much. And yet it 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 197 

will not be able to do its perfect work until we have a 
Department of Hygiene, equipped to detect the evidences 
of disease and of improper living, and clothed with the 
necessary power to enforce its counsel among ignorant or 
negligent parents. If half a dozen parents in as many 
different parts of the city were fined or imprisoned for 
failure, after repeated warnings, to provide their children 
with necessary eyeglasses or to have adenoid growths 
removed, the example thus set would do more lasting good 
than any amount of preaching on the subject. Every 
time a foreign parent is persuaded or compelled to do 
something for the improvement of his child's health, he 
moves a step nearer the American standard of living. 
Nor is the blame to be altogether laid upon the ignorant 
Pole or Italian or Russian, that he does not recognize at 
once, even when duly admonished, the necessity of a 
surgical operation on his child's throat or of procuring 
glasses for his eyes. He has had no training or experience 
that would lead him to a realizing sense of the importance 
of such matters. Before he came to New York, he lived in 
the open country or in a small village, where the outdoor 
life was a powerful preventive against many of the ills to 
which children become heir when crowded in the slums of 
a great city. He has not yet realized that the price he 
must pay for a voice in the government of his adopted 
country and for greater remuneration for his labor, is 
liability to many forms of disease, both for himself and his 
children, that were unknown or unrecognized on his native 
hills and plains. He has escaped from persecution and 
the horrors of famine ; that he and his children may not 
fall victims to the diseases that come with the crowded 



198 A DEPARTMENT OF SCHOOL HYGIENE 

tenement, he requires the strong protection of the law. A 
Department of Hygiene under the Board of Education 
would nobly supplement the work of the Department of 
Health and of the Tenement House Commission. 

5. The establishment of a Department of Hygiene 
under the direction of the Board of Education would be 
both a direct and an indirect saving in financial expendi- 
ture. It has been shown that there were, in June 
last, 158,466 children over the normal age in the various 
grades of the elementary school. As far as I have been 
able to learn, in the absence of detailed reports which the 
Department of Health has declined to furnish, at least 
one third of these over-age children are suffering from 
removable physical defects. Because of these defects they 
are unable to do the school work in the time allowed. 
They remain in the lower grades or in special classes, 
blocking the way for other children. To this cause must 
be attributed in no small degree the fact that 75,000 chil- 
dren are, at the present writing, receiving only a little 
more than half a day's schooling instead of a whole day's 
schooling. In other words, were all children afflicted with 
physical defects enabled, through the removal of these 
defects, to advance at the normal rate of progress, " part 
time " would be very largely eliminated in our schools. 
Even the slight experience we have had with the compara- 
tively few parents who have listened to the admonitions of 
teachers to obey the instructions of the Department of 
Health, affords strong evidence in support of this state- 
ment. The principals are unanimous in the witness they 
bear to the good effects that flow from the removal of 
adenoid growths and the cure of defective eyesight. The 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 igg 

following are a few samples of hundreds of statements 
that have recently been made to me by principals on this 
subject : — 

Pupils are much brighter ; they are more animated, take a deeper interest 
in their work, and consequently they advance more rapidlv. 

Excellent progress in children whose vision has been corrected. 

Helpful, especially in cases of a lenoids and defective vision. 

Mental faculties keener. General intelligence greater ; more alert; 
quicker in work. 

A noticeable improvement in quality of school work. 

Marked improvement. In those fitted with glasses and relieved from ade- 
noids and enlarged tonsils the improvement is very great. 

Where pupils have been provided with eyeglasses they have improved in 
studies. 

Better attention to studies. Greater ease of concentration. 

It has brightened them, as they have been able to give their thoughts to 
their work. 

Where cases have been treated — a decided improvement. The great 
difficulty is to make the parents keep up the treatment. 

Excellent. School work improved. Increased power of attention. 

The establishment of a Department of Hygiene, clothed 
with the necessary power to combat the great evils of 
physical defects in school children, would not cost any 
more than the sum appropriated annually to the Depart- 
ment of Health for the physical examination of school 
children, while the results would be immeasurably better. 

But the indirect saving to the city would be even greater. 
A very large number of children and adults are dependent 
upon either private philanthropy or state support. This 
number is divisible into two classes. First, those who are 
so defective in body, mind, or morals as to make their cases 
hopeless. These must remain charges either directly or 
indirectly to the state during the whole period of their 
lives. There is, however, a very much larger number of 



200 A DEPARTMENT OF SCHOOL HYGIENE 

so-called borderland cases, viz. individuals who with ju- 
dicious care and treatment could become self-supporting in 
the humbler lines of activity, but who without such special 
and judicious care develop into members of the great class 
of paupers, moral defectives, and criminals. It would be 
one of the first aims of the medical inspection and super- 
vision to increase the opportunities of these borderland 
cases, to remove those physical defects which are so com- 
mon in such cases, and which we have recently discovered 
so seriously interfere with their progress both in intellectual 
and in moral training. If, as there is good reason to be- 
lieve, this class is largely recruited from among those who 
were unable to take advantage of education by reason of 
physical defects, its diminution through the application, at 
the school age, of preventive medical skill would mean a 
saving to the state of many millions of dollars annually. 
6. A Department of Hygiene under the control and 
direction of the Board of Education is necessary, because 
existing physical examinations made by the Department 
of Health are generally inadequate, and even where they 
are adequate are not followed by the desired results. 
My reasons for this strong statement are as follows : — 
(a) The inspection by the Department of Health is in- 
adequate, because during the year 1906-1907, as is shown 
by reports made to me by principals, in only 248 schools 
— less than half the total number — were any examinations 
for physical defects — as distinguished from examinations 
to detect contagious disease — made. In these 248 schools 
not more than one third of the pupils were examined. It 
is only a few months since any examinations for physical 
defects were made outside of the boroughs of Manhattan 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 201 

and the Bronx, and then only because of the criticisms 
emanating from the New York Committee on Physical 
Welfare of School Children. 

(b) In the majority of cases — at least three fourths of 
the whole number in which defects are found — the exam- 
inations conducted by the Department of Health serve 
only for the purpose of piling up useless statistics. True, 
postal card notices are sent to the parents of children in 
whom physical defects are discovered. But the Depart- 
ment of Health is not clothed with the power and, appar- 
ently, has not the inclination to compel parents to remedy 
these defects. In the cases where the notices have been 
heeded and defects have been remedied, the good results 
obtained are almost entirely due to the efforts of principals 
and teachers. 

(c) Dual responsibility in the school — that of the Board 
of Education and that of the Department of Health — al- 
ways has resulted and always will result in confusion and 
inefficiency in the work effected. It is owing to this dual 
responsibility that the large annual appropriation made by 
the city for the physical examination of school children is 
to a great degree wasted. Efficient service will be obtained 
only when the Board of Education is made solely responsi- 
ble for all the work that goes on in the schools. 

(d) The physicians employed by the Department of 
Health do not perform many of the functions which it is 
highly advisable should be performed by a truly educa- 
tional Department of Hygiene, such as studying hygienic 
conditions in schools and advising teachers regarding the 
pedagogical treatment of children in cases of fatigue and 
nervousness. 



202 A DEPARTMENT OF SCHOOL HYGIENE 

(e) The nurses employed by the Department of Health 
have done good work in visiting the homes of sick children, 
in giving advice and assistance to mothers, and in looking 
after slight ailments in school. The fact, however, that 
they are under the control of an outside organization is a 
constant hindrance to their work. It is another instance 
of the evil effects that arise from dual control and divided 
responsibility. I risk nothing in saying that the school 
nurses would do much more and better work if they were 
made responsible to the educational authorities. 

For these reasons I urgently recommend that immediate 
steps be taken looking to the establishment, under the 
Board of Education, of a Department of Hygiene. 



I 



XVIII 
SCHOOLS FOR DEFECTIVE CHILDREN 

{From the Greater New York Report for i8gg) 

N March, 1891, the School Board of London, England, 
adopted the following resolution : — 



That special schools, for those children who, by reason of physical or mental 
defect, cannot be properly taught in the ordinary standards or by ordinary 
methods, be established, and that the schools be designated " Schools for 
Special Instruction." 

Since 1891 the children of the London schools have been 
systematically inspected to discover those who, by reason 
of physical or mental defects, are unable to perform the 
ordinary school tasks. The first inspection is made by the 
teachers, who report to a " Superintendent of the Instruc- 
tion of Physically and Mentally Defective Children." Each 
child so reported is examined by the Superintendent and 
the medical officer of the Board. If the report is found 
correct, the child is sent to one of the " centers " for the in- 
struction of defective children in which the largest number 
of pupils under the instruction of one teacher never ex- 
ceeds twenty. 

This systematic inspection has resulted in the discovery 
that fully one per cent of the children attending the Lon- 
don schools are physically or mentally defective. This 
number does not include idiots and imbeciles who require 

203 



204 SCHOOLS FOR DEFECTIVE CHILDREN 

treatment in specially adapted institutions. My own ob- 
servation leads me to believe that the number of physically 
and mentally defective children who can do only a small 
portion of our school work is very large, though not so 
large in proportion as the number in the schools of London. 
Every teacher of experience knows that such children can- 
not receive the training they require in our large classes. 
Every man who has studied the life around him knows that 
the defective or the degenerate who is left untrained, grows 
up a burden to himself and his relatives and a menace to 
society. The testimony is conclusive, however, that train- 
ing suited to each individual case can be given which will 
largely strengthen or overcome natural weakness. The 
weakness, whatever it be — mental, moral, or physical — 
is, in nearly all such cases, the result of inherited tendency. 
Many persons, of whom I am one, believe it to be the duty of 
the state to prevent the marriage of men and women who 
are incapable of producing an offspring that is sound — 
sound mentally as well as physically. But, as long as de- 
fective children are brought into the world, humanity 
demands, the interests of the state require, that such chil- 
dren should receive that training which will, as far as 
possible, neutralize inherited evil tendencies and develop 
the good seed that otherwise will have fallen among thorns 
or by the roadside. And let no one think the task im- 
possible. "We know," says a high authority, "that phys- 
ical hereditary tendencies can be neutralized and often 
nullified by proper counteracting precautions. How much 
more possible, then, to conquer or change inherited predis- 
positions to evil, when we consider that such earnest and 
judicious endeavor must, in such large measure, enjoy the 









GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1899 205 

blessing and direction and stimulating influence of the 
Divine, the author of all good and the mighty to save from 
evil ! " 

I purpose taking steps at an early day to find out through 
the Borough Superintendents how many children in the 
schools are reported by their teachers as mentally or physi- 
cally defective. When the number has been ascertained, 
it will then be the province of the Board of Education and 
the School Boards to determine what medical and educa- 
tional investigation is necessary to determine whether the 
children reported fall into the category of the purely im- 
becile, who are, I believe, beyond the reach of the public 
school, or whether they belong to the various classes of the 
defective. It will also be the province of your Board to 
determine what provision shall be made for the special 
teaching of these unfortunate children. I would recom- 
mend, however, that in the first instance, at least, no very 
extensive scheme be adopted. My only reason for this 
suggestion is that to the school authorities of New York 
the whole subject is a new one. Mistakes will certainly be 
made in any attempt to solve the extremely delicate problem 
before us, and mistakes are much more easily corrected 
when the field of experiment is small than when it is large. 
I would, therefore, recommend, that " centers " for the 
training of defectives be established only under the super- 
vision of principals who evince enthusiasm for the work. 

Years ago schools for defectives — schools distinct from 
our noble institutions for the blind and for the deaf and 
dumb — should have been established in New York and 
Brooklyn. The present boards can originate no more 
potent claim to grateful remembrance in the hearts of the 



206 SCHOOLS FOR DEFECTIVE CHILDREN 

people of this city than by the establishment of schools for 
the proper training of those children, who, through no fault 
of their own, are, in the absence of such training, fore- 
doomed to lives of misery and, in the great majority of 
cases, to lives of crime. 

[From the Greater New York Report for f<poj) 

The necessity and wisdom of special methods of educa- 
tion in the public schools for children who are backward 
or so defective mentally and physically as to make regular 
class work of little or no value to them are rapidly being 
recognized in this country. In the movement for a type of 
class which will, where possible, make these children self- 
supporting instead of allowing them to become a charge 
upon the state, New York City has taken a leading position. 
Although the work is but young, already a large number 
of classes for these unfortunates are in operation. These 
classes are supplemented by a large number of classes for 
teaching English to foreign children who, while not lack- 
ing in mental power, are prevented by lack of knowledge of 
English from taking the place in the grades which their 
age and general knowledge warrant. These classes of 
course are not to be confused with those for defective 
children. I cannot, however, agree that these classes, 
where the work of the teacher is solely that of the educa- 
tional expert in English and common branches, should be 
under the supervision of the medical adviser. His con- 
nection with these classes is merely to determine whether 
the child's backwardness is due to physical or mental de- 
fect, in which case the pupil is a subject for a class for 
defectives, rather than a coaching class in English. The 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1905 207 

physician's beneficent service should stop, I think, with 
careful diagnosis. 

The report on the work among defective children pre- 
pared by Elias G. Brown, M.D., contains much of value 
and interest. In the first place, he reports a large number 
of new examinations of children and an increase in the 
number of special classes. It is only to be regretted that 
as yet it has been impossible to organize enough of these 
very important saving stations for all who need them. It 
must be remembered, however, that this work so far has 
been in an experimental stage. The time of experiment 
now is ended — the ungraded classes have fully justified 
their existence — and for the future there remains, as a 
wise economy and as an act of justice to helpless children, 
the wide extension of this system. To accomplish this 
end, the Board of Education has authorized the appoint- 
ment of an Inspector of Ungraded Classes, whose duty will 
be to supervise the work of existing classes, to aid in the 
formation of others, and to train teachers for this special 
work. 

There are a number of significant points in Dr. Brown's 
report. Some of these are his statements as to the danger 
of allowing a mentally defective child to remain in a class 
of normal children and the parents' sympathy with the 
special classes. His statement as to the blank forms used 
in diagnosis must be of interest to those having to do with 
this work, and his division of the children into differing 
groups for special treatment is worthy of careful study. 
Of especial interest, however, is his conclusion that many 
children are defectives because of malnutrition, insufficient 
or improper food, or nervousness. In discussing improper 



208 SCHOOLS FOR DEFECTIVE CHILDREN 

diet, Dr. Brown finds excessive use of tea and coffee a 
potent reason for defect in the child. His remarks upon 
the use of such stimulants by children should be brought 
home to every parent ignorant enough to give such bever- 
ages to the very young. 

The most important conclusion from Dr. Brown's report 
is that, in many cases, the child is bad or dull, not because 
of evil propensity, but from some inherited or acquired 
physical or mental defect which makes it impossible for 
him to be like his normal fellows. Certainly in this there 
is a strong argument against the substitution of corporal 
punishment for the employment of merciful correctives. 
For the teacher who strikes the child may be striking a 
little body already diseased and helpless, and so may 
be visiting in cruelty the sins of the fathers upon the 
children. 

Of Dr. Brown's recommendations, one is distinctly radi- 
cal, but deserves most careful consideration — the establish- 
ment of a boarding school for defective children, with 
departments for such advanced types as epileptics, the 
blind, and the deaf. Whether the city should enter a field 
that is at least partially occupied by the state is an open 
question, though it may be reasonably argued that if the 
city is justified in maintaining a boarding school for able- 
bodied children who do not want to go to school, it would 
be even more justified in maintaining a boarding school for 
physically defective children who do want and who impera- 
tively need the advantages of special training. Of such 
children there are at least three distinct classes in this 
city — the blind, the deaf, and the crippled. The number 
of children in each of these classes probably runs into the 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1905 209 

thousands. The public schools make no provisions for 
them. How may the necessary provision be made ? In 
my judgment, boarding schools, at least in the first instance, 
are not necessary. The establishment of day schools with 
the necessary equipment and specially trained teachers would 
meet the exigencies of the situation. 

(Here were quoted "authoritative " though anonymous statements regard- 
ing the institutions for the education of crippled, deaf and dumb, and blind 
children in New York City. — The Editors.) 

Under these circumstances, can there be any doubt that 
the Board of Education ought at once to enter upon this 
beneficent educational work ? Should any child be de- 
prived of free public education because it is suffering from 
some physical defect ? Surely not. The time has long 
since gone by when it could be said that the education of 
the blind, the deaf, and the crippled is an impossibility. 
The results of private and charitable effort have proved 
that these unfortunates may, by skillful training, be made 
in many cases wage earners and in nearly all cases may be 
enabled to obtain many of the legitimate satisfactions and 
enjoyments of life. Why, then, should the parent of any 
physically defective child be compelled to resort to charity 
for its education ? And why should the parent who would 
scorn to accept charity, but is too poor to pay the fees 
charged by private institutions, be deprived of the benefits 
of free public education ? There is but one answer to these 
questions — the city should establish schools for the train- 
ing of the deaf, the blind, and the crippled. 

Note. — The result of this appeal was the establishment of schools for 
crippled children, deaf and dumb children, and blind children. — The Edi- 
tors. 



2IO SCHOOLS FOR DEFECTIVE CHILDREN 

CLASSES FOR MENTALLY DEFECTIVE CHILDREN 

{From the Greater New York Report for 1906) 

Classes for mentally defective children, officially known 
as ungraded classes, have been in existence for some years. 
I regret to be obliged to say that they have not been in 
some cases as well managed as they ought to have been. 
This fact is due chiefly to three causes : lack of expert 
supervision, lack of special training on the part of many of 
the teachers assigned to these classes, and lack of proper 
discrimination in placing children in these classes. It is 
true that Dr. E. G. Brown, a member of the physical train- 
ing staff, has made examinations to determine the question 
whether children were of such a nature as properly to be 
classed as defectives. These examinations, while of very 
great value, have lost a good deal of their efficacy through 
the lack of machinery to put their results into execution. 
A very long step toward the reform of this very important 
part of the public school service was taken last June, when 
the office of Inspector of Ungraded Classes was created by 
the Board of Education. The incumbent of this office is 
Miss Elizabeth E. Farrell, who for ten years was an un- 
usually successful teacher of mentally defective children in 
Public School No. I, Manhattan. Since the appointment 
of Miss Farrell, by-laws have been adopted by your Board, 
the operation of which, there is every reason to believe, 
will substantially correct the defects in the management of 
these classes referred to above. These rules provide in 
brief that the Inspector of Ungraded Classes shall report 
to the Board of Superintendents on all applications of prin- 
cipals for permission to organize ungraded classes and 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1906 211 

upon the fitness of teachers proposed for assignment to 
such classes ; that no child shall be admitted to or removed 
from an ungraded class without the approval in writing of 
the Inspector of Ungraded Classes, or the permission of 
the Board of Superintendents, and that no child shall be 
placed in an ungraded class who has not been examined as 
to his physical and mental condition by the Inspector of 
Ungraded Classes and by a member of the physical train- 
ing staff, who shall be a physician. 

Experience has amply demonstrated that two things are 
essential to the proper conduct of classes for defective 
children — properly equipped classrooms and teachers of 
peculiar natural gifts who have also had the advantage of 
special training. With regard to the equipment of the 
classroom, experience shows that running water in the 
classroom, proximity to bathing facilities, movable seats 
and desks, benches for manual training, and apparatus for 
physical culture, are necessary. It has been demonstrated 
that bathing is one of the best preventives of evil habits 
that frequently accompany mental insufficiency, and that 
lethargic minds may be stimulated, and that mental defects, 
which would not yield to the ordinary school exercises, 
may be at least partially corrected, by manual training 
and physical culture. 

One of the chief duties of the Inspector of Ungraded 
Classes will be to discover teachers who have natural apti- 
tude for the very difficult and delicate work of dealing 
with defective minds. The teacher who is to take up this 
work should be peculiarly adapted to it by nature. She 
should have insight into child nature, affection for children, 
and ability for leadership. She should be resourceful and 



212 SCHOOLS FOR DEFECTIVE CHILDREN 

inventive, reaching and quickening the spirit of those who 
suffer. She should be wise and tactful, not only with chil- 
dren but with adults, for if she is to succeed, she must be- 
come the friend and adviser of the family, in order to get 
the cooperation so necessary to the best work of the child. 
She must be sanguine, cheerful, optimistic, patient, and 
have infinite capacity for taking pains. The ideal placed be- 
fore such a teacher by Professor Royce is none too high : — 

Your ideal must be here to get a real, or close, a truly psychological in- 
sight into this possibly deranged mental mechanism. You must come now, 
not any longer as a disciplinarian, but quite sincerely as friend, as humane 
man offering help to a younger brother in distress. . . . You must be a true 
naturalist, and study this live creature, as a biologist would study cell growth 
under a microscope, or as a pathologist would minutely examine diseased 
tissues. In order to study, you must, of course, love. Minds and their 
processes must be delightful things in your eyes. . . . Intolerance and im- 
patience have absolutely no place in such a scrutiny. You must fear nothing. 
You will be very tender with the sanctities of youthful feeling; but if, in the 
course of your scrutiny, a poor heart gets open to you, and you find it a very 
evil heart indeed, you will never show — yes, if you are wise, you will seldom 
feel — any contempt. 

Even the teacher endowed with the rarest natural gifts 
for this work, will find her efficiency vastly increased by 
an intimate acquaintance with what other great teachers 
have accomplished in the same line. For this purpose spe- 
cial training is needed. We have not in connection with 
our city system any department giving special training to 
teachers of mentally defective children. Under these cir- 
cumstances, it has been deemed wise by your Board that 
opportunity should be given to the teachers of such classes, 
to obtain the training that they need in institutions which 
exist for the purpose in other parts of the country. Hence, 
the following by-law was adopted : — 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1906 213 

Upon the recommendation of the inspector of ungraded classes, a teacher 
assigned to an ungraded class may be given a leave of absence with full pay 
for not more than three months within the school year by the Board of Edu- 
cation, on the recommendation of the Board of Superintendents, for purposes 
of study in a school for the training of teachers of defective children. A 
teacher to whom such leave has been granted shall report to the inspector of 
ungraded classes as the latter shall require. 

Note. — In 1912, a department for the training of teachers of mentally 
defective children was established in the Brooklyn Training School for 
Teachers. — The Editors. 



XIX 
TRUANT SCHOOLS 

The Parental School with its farm of one hundred acres and its magnificent 
buildings was the result of the following discussion. The compulsory educa- 
tion law has been amended in accordance with the suggestion contained in 
the last paragraph. — The Editors. 

{From the Greater New York Report for iSgg) 

TWO schools for truants who are no longer susceptible 
to ordinary school influences are maintained, one by 
the School Board of Manhattan and The Bronx, the other 
by the School Board of Brooklyn. The school systems of 
Queens and Richmond are too small to maintain effective 
truant schools. They pay for the support of their sup- 
posedly incorrigible truants in institutions outside the city 
limits. To my thinking, it is not consistent with the dig- 
nity and prestige of our city that any of its divisions should 
be obliged to go outside its own limits in order to find 
necessary school accommodations. 

I recommend, therefore, that the necessary legislative 
action be sought to place all truant schools under the care 
of the Board of Education, to the end that they may be 
open to the truants committed to such institutions from any 
part of the city. A considerable expenditure of money will 
be needed to supply adequate provision for the confinement 
and training of truants. The Manhattan truant school h 

214 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1899 215 

housed in a small and unsuitable building, without grounds, 
in a densely populated section of the city. The Brooklyn 
school has ample grounds, but an antiquated and defective 
building. The city of New York should have one truant 
school, or perhaps two such schools, situated far from the 
centers of population, surrounded by ample grounds, and 
supplied with every facility for manual training, garden- 
ing, farming, and trade teaching, as well as the ordinary 
school appliances. Experience has abundantly demon- 
strated that the truant may be cured of his roving pro- 
pensities by the exercise of kindness mingled with firmness 
and by continuous application to labor. One institution 
of this kind, adequate to the present needs of the whole 
city, could easily be maintained for the amount it now 
costs to support the two truant schools in Brooklyn and 
Manhattan. 

Should schools or classes for defective children be es- 
tablished, I should confidently look for a diminution in the 
amount of truancy, because physical and mental defects are 
potent causes in rousing children to rebellion against the 
work of the ordinary school. It is safe to assume, there- 
fore, that if the defectives were subjected to appropriate 
training at an early age, say seven or eight years, the 
ranks of the truants, who generally develop their peculiar 
propensity at about ten years of age, would be considerably 
diminished. Still, however, we shall always have truants, 
and these will almost certainly become criminals if they 
are not furnished before the years of adolescence with an 
entirely new outfit of habits. For such as these a truant 
school — a place of confinement and a place of labor — 
will always be necessary. 



2l6 TRUANT SCHOOLS 

The work of truant schools is seriously hampered by the 
provision of the existing law which requires that all the 
inmates shall be discharged at the expiration of the school 
year — July 31. Experience has demonstrated that less 
than a year's treatment is, as a rule, of little or no avail 
to enable a truant to acquire those habits of order and 
industry without which success in life, of even the most 
moderate kind, is impossible. To make these schools prop- 
erly effective, it should be possible to commit a supposedly 
incorrigible truant until he shows unmistakable signs of 
improvement, or has reached the close of the compulsory 
school age. In no case should a truant be confined beyond 
the age of sixteen in a truant school or other institution to 
which truants may be committed. Above that age boys or 
girls who are not amenable to the discipline of the school 
or the home are fit subjects for reformatories. 



XX 

SUMMER SCHOOLS AND PLAYGROUNDS 

{From the Brooklyn Report for i88g) 

THE average attendance upon the public schools of this 
city is about 75,000 children. For those of them 
who have intellectual resources, such as games, books, and 
pictures, in their homes, and who can exchange the atmos- 
phere of the school for the atmosphere of the seaside or 
the mountains, the long summer vacation is a most excellent 
thing. But probably not 20 per cent of our school children 
possess all these advantages. What of the other 80 per 
cent? For them there is no sojourn at the seaside or 
among the mountains. For them there are the hot and 
dusty streets. For them there is little enjoyment or profit, 
either physical or intellectual, from the long vacation. They 
return to school in the fall, with their physical powers 
benefited little if at all, and with their minds relaxed, dulled, 
and often perverted. 

Were they given the opportunity of attending school 
three hours every morning during the summer, say from 
eight to eleven o'clock, they would, I am confident, derive 
more physical benefit than is now possible from the long 
vacation, while their mental powers would be kept in a 
condition of healthy activity. I submit this proposition for 
the consideration of your Board, as one eminently worthy 

217 



2l8 SUMMER SCHOOLS AND PLAYGROUNDS 

of attention. The experiment might easily be tried without 
great expense in a few schools situated in different parts 
of the city, and, if successful, the scheme could be extended. 

VACATION SCHOOLS AND PLAYGROUNDS 

The recommendation for the establishment of summer schools first made 
in 1889, Dore fruit 'in 1899, when ten schools, with an average attendance of 
4434 pupils, were maintained in Manhattan, and five schools with an average 
attendance of 1609 pupils in Brooklyn. Upon these activities Dr. Maxwell 
makes the following comments. — The Editors. 

(From the Greater New York Report for i8gg) 

While the vacation school is still in its infancy, it is des- 
tined, I believe, to play a large part in future in our educa- 
tional economy. Especially in the tenement-house district 
it has been a great blessing to those children who became 
its pupils. The pity is that so few children attended. To 
watch a few hundred children in a vacation school on the 
lower east side of Manhattan, thoroughly enjoying their 
sewing, or drawing, or painting, or woodwork, and then 
to see the thousands of children making futile and unintel- 
ligent attempts at play in the broiling streets outside, pre- 
sents a contrast which causes one to regret that no effective 
way has been discovered to bring home to the minds of 
fathers and mothers in the tenement districts the advan- 
tages of the vacation schools. The movement, however, 
will undoubtedly grow, and year by year, if more liberal 
appropriations are made for the support of these schools, it 
may be expected that the people will more generally learn 
to appreciate their usefulness. 

I must commend particularly the work done in these 
schools in nature study, in water colors, in sewing, and in 






GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1899 219 

woodwork. Much excellent work was also done in the 
kindergartens, though in some of the Manhattan schools 
it was seriously retarded by the selection of unsuitable 
rooms from which the ordinary school furniture had not 
been removed. To attempt to conduct a kindergarten 
class in a room filled with seats and desks suited to children 
twelve years of age, is a mistake that should not be repeated. 

Besides the purposes for which they were more immedi- 
ately instituted, the vacation schools have developed a pos- 
sibility that will, I have no doubt, be of great service to the 
whole school system. They may, in a sense, be regarded 
as experiment stations that will supply valuable sugges- 
tions as to work in the regular schools. For instance, nature 
study, which has been nearly everywhere a failure in the 
regular schools, was rendered, comparatively at least, a 
success in many of the vacation schools, by employing qual- 
ified persons to collect and distribute specimens for individ- 
ual study. If this plan were adopted in the day schools, it 
would very soon render this study, as it ought to be, one 
of the most interesting and useful in the curriculum. 

Another excellent feature of the vacation schools was the 
reading room, in which those children who desired to do 
so, could spend a quiet hour in the perusal of wholesome 
and interesting literature. The circulating libraries that 
furnished the necessary reading matter deserve the thanks 
of the school authorities. 

In connection with the vacation schools in Manhattan, 
rooms in many school buildings were opened to the citizens 
of the neighborhood for purposes of reading and quiet 
amusement. It is earnestly to be hoped that this move- 
ment will be continued throughout the year and extended 



2 20 SUMMER SCHOOLS AND PLAYGROUNDS 

to all the boroughs. No good reason can be given why 
the school buildings erected and maintained at the public 
expense should be occupied only five or six hours a day, 
when they might easily be used as public library stations 
and centers of rational amusement. 

I commend to the consideration of the School Board of 
Queens the propriety of establishing vacation schools in 
the more densely populated parts of Long Island City. 

The playgrounds or schools organized by Manhattan and 
Brooklyn were, on the whole, less successful than the 
vacation schools. There needs to be much careful experi- 
mentation and recording of results before it can be even 
approximately determined just what games should be used 
and what system of discipline should be maintained in 
public playgrounds. The conduct of playgrounds on the 
recreation piers was, as I saw it, of doubtful propriety. 
The question is open to discussion whether the school 
authorities should conduct any educational exercises amid 
surroundings which they cannot control and which some- 
times do not tend to elevation of character. 

Note. — From this small beginning in 1899 the vacation schools and play- 
grounds increased, until during the summer of 1912 there were 33 vacation 
schools with an average daily attendance of 25,812, and 220 public school play- 
grounds with an average daily attendance of 124,135. — The Editors. 

SUMMER HIGH SCHOOLS 

Dr. Maxwell's advocacy of summer sessions of the high schools was, after 
the lapse of five years, crowned with success in 191 2, when two summer high 
schools were established. — The Editors. 

{From the Greater Netv York Report for 1907) 

The principals of the high schools are unanimous in de- 
claring that the largest number of students who leave the 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 22 1 

high schools, leave during the long summer vacation. 
They either find employment for the summer months and 
do not care to forsake it to return to school in September, 
or they become so enamored of freedom that school work 
thereafter loses its charms. Moreover, there are many 
hundreds of children who graduate from the elementary 
schools in June who are lost to the high schools through 
similar causes. Again, there are many over-age students 
and many bright and ambitious students who would be 
glad of an opportunity to shorten their course of prepara- 
tion for college or training school by taking advantage of 
a summer high school course, as college students now 
shorten their college courses by attending summer college 
courses. The advantages of summer high school courses 
may be enumerated as follows : — 

1. They would lessen student mortality. 

2. By concentrating attention on one or not more than 
two courses, it would be possible for the teachers to do more 
than can possibly be done in the regular high schools in 
the way of teaching students how to study. 

3. They would give over-age or backward children an 
opportunity to shorten their high school course by allowing 
them to make up a study in which they failed the previous 
term in one of the regular high schools. 

4. They would give bright and ambitious students a 
chance either to shorten their preparation for college or 
training school, or to study a subject or subjects which 
otherwise they would be obliged to omit by reason of lack 
of time in the regular course. 

5. They would provide continuous work for the pupils 
who graduate from the elementary schools in June. 



222 SUMMER SCHOOLS AND PLAYGROUNDS 

6. They would enable us to utilize to fuller advantage 
our costly high school buildings. 

As to the management of the summer high schools, I 
offer the following suggestions : — 

i. The length of the summer course should be not less 
than seven, and not more than eight, weeks. 

2. Students should not be permitted to take more than 
two studies. 

3. The daily session should extend from 8 a.m. to 12 m. 

4. At least one hour a day should be devoted to study 
under direction. 

5. Half an hour a day should be devoted to exercise in 
the gymnasium. 






XXI 
CONTINUATION VS. EVENING SCHOOL 

(From the Greater New York Report for 1911} 

THE most unsatisfactory part of the evening school 
work is the elementary schools. These are attended 
largely by boys and girls who did not complete the course in 
the day elementary schools, and who went to work without 
adequate preparation for the duties of life, as soon as the 
law permitted. They do not attend regularly, and they do 
not derive as much benefit as they need from their studies. 
The reasons are obvious. On the one hand, they come 
to evening school tired out with a long, hard day's work. 
They need to sleep or to play, rather than to study. On 
the other hand, we give them only a diluted form of the 
day school curriculum. They do not recognize the use of 
the lessons in reading, history, and arithmetic. What the 
teacher presents is without special interest for them. 
They approach their studies without energy and con- 
sequently without profit. Under these conditions there 
need be little wonder that the elementary evening schools 
are not more successful than they are. The wonder is 
that the attendance and interest are not worse. 

After observing and studying these schools for thirty 
years, I am now convinced that the attempt to give in- 
struction in the ordinary elementary branches in the 

223 



224 CONTINUATION VS. EVENING SCHOOL 

evening to boys and girls from fourteen to sixteen years 
of age is a mistaken policy. Those who are employed 
during the day need the evening for exercise and recre- 
ation. Only those who are endowed with unusual physical 
strength and unusual mental energy can, after a hard day's 
work, attend school four evenings a week and benefit 
thereby. That they need instruction, for their own sakes 
and for the sake of the community, goes without saying. 
How and when are they to get it ? It has been demonstrated 
over and over again that they do not get it advantageously 
when the school time is taken out of their time for recre- 
ation — the evening hours. It follows that, if they are to 
get it at all, they must get it out of their employers' time. 
I recommend, therefore, that in lieu of the evening 
elementary schools, a system of continuation schools from 
y to 9 a.m. and from 4 to 6 p.m. be organized, that 
legislation be sought to require employers to give to each 
employee under nineteen years of age four or six hours a 
week for forty weeks each year, and to constrain young 
people between these ages to attend such schools regularly. 
These schools would become true continuation schools ; that 
is, they would continue under favorable conditions the edu- 
cation, even while the boy or girl is at work, which was 
broken off at any year below the nineteenth. An effort 
too should be made to adapt the work of these schools to the 
individual capacities and needs of each pupil. To this end 
the cooperation of employers should be sought not only 
to inform the teachers as to the special needs of each 
pupil, but to require the pupil's attendance. 

Money is being spent most liberally on the education in 
splendidly equipped high schools of those boys and girls 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 191 1 225 

who are so situated that they can make school-going the 
chief business of their lives until they are at least eighteen, 
and often much longer. Are the state and the city to take 
so little interest in the less fortunate, who are the great 
majority, that all the education they can offer them is the 
three R's at the period of the day when the brain refuses, 
or is too weary, to act ? Are employers to have the best of 
the child's day at toil that is often grinding and poorly re- 
munerated and leave him little if any chance to cultivate 
those functions of mind and body upon which success and 
happiness in after life depend ? The interest of the com- 
munity as well as of the individual demands that the child 
who has not the opportunity to pursue a high school course 
or even to complete the elementary school, shall be kept 
under the tutelage of the state and shall be given such 
schooling as he can profit by, until the end of the high 
school age. Employers will in the end gain by the ar- 
rangement, because with improved training their youthful 
employees will become more efficient and hence more valu- 
able. The community will be the gainer because the aver- 
age of the efficiency and intelligence of its citizens will be 
raised. But the greatest advantage will come to the indi- 
vidual, who will study when the mind is not worn out, and 
who may still spend the evening in wholesome recreation 
with his fellows. 



XXII 

SCHOOL LIBRARIES 

{From the Brooklyn Report for i8gi) 

A WELL selected school library for pupils' use ought 
to be a part of the equipment of every well ap- 
pointed school. In lieu of this, some arrangement ought 
to be entered into either with the Brooklyn Library or with 
the proposed new city library, by which approved books 
would be loaned to the children of the public schools. The 
extent to which the Pratt Library and the library of the 
Union for Christian Work are used by the school children 
of their respective neighborhoods, is evidence that such 
action by your Board would be amply appreciated. In- 
deed, I confidently look forward to the time when every 
public school will be a distributing center for a great free 
public library. 

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL LIBRARIES 
{From the Greater New York Report for igo2) 

Much discussion has been wasted as to whether we 
should have in the elementary schools, school libraries, or 
class libraries, or grade libraries. If by " school library " 
is meant a reading room sufficiently large to accommodate 
many readers at one time, such a library is even more out 
of the question in the elementary school than in the high 

226 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1902 227 

school. Sufficient space cannot be found or provided for 
that purpose. Even if it were desirable, the school library, 
in the sense in which I am using the term, is impossible. 

If, on the other hand, by the term " school library " is 
simply meant a room in which the library books are stored 
and which is not intended as a reading room, experience 
shows that the plan operates, as in the case of the high 
schools, to prevent the general use of the books. 

If the library books are to be generally used by the 
pupils, they must be scattered through the classrooms 
where they may be easily found. If this principle is cor- 
rect, the question then arises as between class libraries and 
grade libraries. A little observation and reflection will 
convince any intelligent person that in our large schools 
the class library is impossible. There are about 10,000 
classes in the elementary schools. We have not the means 
to provide 10,000 libraries. Nor is it necessary to do so. 
A well selected library for each grade in a school is quite 
sufficient, no matter how many classes may be organized 
in a grade. In the lower grades the number of books in 
the grade library will necessarily be very small and com- 
paratively inexpensive. As we approach the highest grade 
the libraries will be more extensive and more costly. In 
the four highest grades, where departmental teaching is 
gradually effecting an entrance, the grade libraries should 
be departmental, as in the high schools. There should be 
in each school in which these grades are taught a history 
library, a geography library, a literature library, an art 
library, and an elementary science library. 

In addition to the grade libraries, there should be in 
every school a well selected library of books of reference 



228 SCHOOL LIBRARIES 

and of works on principles and methods of teaching and 
on school management for the use of teachers. 

The selection of books for grade libraries has been un- 
der consideration by a committee of the Board of Superin- 
tendents and is now approaching completion. When this 
work is finished, there will remain only certain mechanical 
difficulties, such as the provision of shelving for the books 
in classrooms, and the ordering, supply, and cataloguing 
of the books. Fortunately, in the boroughs of Manhattan 
and The Bronx, where grade libraries have been established 
in most schools for several years, the mechanical difficulties 
can scarcely be said to exist. 

With the completion of many other urgent tasks required 
by the reorganization of our school system, it will be pos- 
sible in future to devote more time to the consideration of 
this subject. The great object of the school library is not 
so much to supply information as to cultivate the reading 
habit, to create a love for what is good in literature, and to 
teach the right way of using books when information is 
sought. By establishing grade and departmental libraries 
in all classes of schools we may do much to secure these 
ends. 

The public libraries ought to be brought into close rela- 
tion with the public schools. Their treasures cannot be 
used to better advantage than in ministering to the intel- 
lectual and moral development of the young. 

Note. — Dr. Maxwell's recommendations as to grade libraries and reference 
libraries for teachers were put into effect almost immediately. Since 1902 the 
state library fund and an equal amount appropriated by the city, amounting 
to about $55,000 per annum, have been expended in developing these libraries. 
The total circulation of books from these libraries amounted in the school year 
1911-12 to 9,570,878. — The Editors. 



XXIII 

DEPARTMENTAL TEACHING IN ELEMEN- 
TARY SCHOOLS 

In conference with the principals of elementary schools, Dr. Maxwell 
suggested the introduction of departmental teaching in the higher grades of 
the elementary schools. This plan had been tried successfully in Brooklyn 
prior to consolidation. In the following pages the theory and practice of 
departmental teaching in the grades are discussed. — The Editors. 

(From the Greater A T ew York Report for igoj) 

OF the many changes brought about in the local schools, 
none probably has been provocative of more serious 
discussion than the wide adoption by principals of grammar 
schools of the system of departmental instruction as a sub- 
stitute for the class-teacher plan. Under the old class 
method, each teacher was in charge of a single class to 
which he or she taught all the subjects of one grade. 
Under the departmental program several teachers are as- 
signed to instruct each class in the three highest or, more 
often, in the two highest years of the elementary course. 
The method of division is on the seemingly logical basis of 
subject rather than of groups of children. For instance, 
one teacher who has a special aptitude for such a branch 
as is shown by her ability to obtain a higher or specialist's 
license, will be assigned to teach mathematics in the last 
two or three years ; a second will do similar work in Eng- 
lish; a third will be placed in charge of the teaching of 

229 



230 DEPARTMENTAL TEACHING 

elementary science, and so on until the subjects are all 
apportioned among those specially qualified to teach them. 
Such divisions, however, are not arbitrary. A teacher 
with more than one specialty may, if the program per- 
mits, give instruction in two or more branches, or, if the 
classes be numerous, two teachers may share the responsi- 
bility in certain subjects. 

In theory, this plan of having children taught specific 
subjects by those with special ability to impart the content 
of those branches, seems almost axiomatic in its superiority 
over a system where one teacher gives instruction in all 
branches of one grade. Educational theory, however, un- 
fortunately does not always accomplish expected results, 
and in public school systems results, not theories, are the 
aim and end. The substitution of a plan of this nature for 
the old class system of tuition involves, of necessity, radical 
changes in school organization. Young children must be 
moved from study hall to recitation room at the beginning 
of each period, or else, if they be assigned to permanent 
rooms, must accustom themselves at each period to a new 
teacher who visits them. The question arises, therefore, 
as to whether the change from the " mothering " plan, 
where the instructor has complete charge of a class through- 
out a term, to a system of divided influence and movement, 
is in practice a beneficial innovation. Considerations of 
conduct and of ethical influence enter into the discussion 
as well as those of instruction. It is most difficult under 
any circumstances to predicate the effect of a theory of 
education before its actual employment and, in a cosmo- 
politan city such as New York, it is impossible to foretell 
results of important innovations with absolute accuracy, 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1903 23 1 

for the reason that there is no means of determining what 
constitutes the typical class of pupils. 

For these several reasons it was not considered wise to 
make departmental teaching compulsory in the schools. 
No principal was required to inaugurate the plan. The 
wide introduction of this system which now prevails in 132 
schools is attributable solely, therefore, to the choice of 
the principals who were entirely free to continue the 
old plan or to experiment with the new as their judgments 
prompted. The system had been discussed at a conference 
of principals some months ago, but while the apparent 
advantages and possible disadvantages of this plan in its 
application to the last two years of the course were analyzed 
freely, no insistence upon the new order was advanced 
officially. Possibly this free discussion bore some fruit, and 
doubtless the new course of study, with its ready adaptability 
to such a plan, also prompted many to try the experiment. 
But in each case the principals were entirely free to do as 
they deemed wise for their particular schools. 

The fact, however, that 132 principals are now employ- 
ing departmental teaching is not in itself conclusive. Nor 
would any discussion of the problem from the theoretical 
standpoint be entirely convincing. I have considered it 
wise, therefore, to go to practice and its actual results for 
my answer to the question, " Is departmental teaching in 
the elementary schools a good thing, a hurtful thing, or a 
plan without special effect?" Those best fitted to answer 
this question, it seemed to me, were the principals of the 
schools in which such instruction is now in actual use. 
Therefore I sent to all principals of elementary schools the 
following circular letter: — 



232 DEPARTMENTAL TEACHING 

December n, 1903. 
To Principals of Elementary Schools : 

Ladies and Gentlemen : Will you kindly write answers to the ac- 
companying questions and send them to me not later than December 18, 
1903 ? 

Respectfully yours, 

William H. Maxwell, 

City Superintendent of Schools. 

1. Have you introduced the departmental system of teaching ? 

In what grades ? 
How many teachers are working in this way ? 

2. What is the effect on the teachers ? 
(a) Interest in work ? 

{b) Methods of teaching ? 

3. What is the effect on pupils ? 
(a) Interest in work ? 

(&) Results of work ? 

(c) Conduct ? 

(d) Penmanship ? 

To the question, " Have you introduced the departmental 
system of teaching ? " 132 principals replied in the affirma- 
tive. The other questions were answered with few excep- 
tions in each case. These replies I have tabulated most 
carefully, giving to doubtful verdicts their exact value. In 
summarizing these results I have endeavored to eliminate 
my own very positive views in favor of the new plan and 
to give, as far as possible, an unbiased digest of the opinions 
of the principals actually doing this work. This summary 
follows : — 

STATISTICAL RESULTS 

Number of schools in which the departmental system is 
employed : — 

Borough of Manhattan 71 

Borough of The Bronx 11 

Borough of Brooklyn . . . . . . . 19 

Borough of Queens ........ 23 

Borough of Richmond 8 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1903 233 

Total number of teachers thus employed, 827. 

Ten other principals reported that they intend to intro- 
duce departmental work in 1904. 

Three principals replied that they had tried the plan in 
the past and had abandoned it. 

In answer to the question, " In what grades ? " 97 
reported that they were using it throughout the last 
two years of the course; 10 replied that it was in use 
in the work of the last year, and 25 gave replies 
which can be summarized only as " scattering." These 
use the system from the fourth year up in all possible 
combinations. 

a 

( Then follows a tabulation of the opinions of the principals) 

After a careful analysis of all the returns, I find myself 
sorely tempted to give to departmental teaching as a device 
for New York schools a somewhat less reserved commen- 
dation than the results at present fully justify. There is 
always present, in statistical considerations, a tendency to 
look upon the data compiled as being complete and as not 
being modified in any way by the broader questions which 
enter into every educational problem. There is also the 
temptation, when a plan theoretically very promising 
shows numerically great instances of success or actual 
benefit and a larger proportion of instances where no 
deterioration has resulted after brief trial, to overlook 
future possibilities in practice and to yield unreservedly 
to the call of attractive theory. Just such a condition 
as this is introduced into the present discussion by the 
small number of those who vote against the plan in the 
several particulars. 



234 



DEPARTMENTAL TEACHING 



It must not be forgotten, however, that the answers to 
these ten or twelve questions, no matter how carefully they 
are prepared, cannot exhaust the entire subject or determine 
final judgments. Many considerations not definitely 
touched upon by any of these questions must be weighed. 
In the first place many of the schools have not tried the 
plan, and it is as yet somewhat hazardous to predict that 
what is successful in many classrooms and not successful 
in a few would be an educational boon to all. Further- 
more, those who have tried the plan have, in most instances, 
been experimenting with it but a short time. All have not 
yet been able to watch the growth of the child through all 
the grades in which this system is used. A third consider- 
ation is the fact that a new course of study has just been 
put into operation and has called upon the teacher for 
accommodation to new conditions entirely apart from the 
novelties of the specialist system of instruction. This 
raises the question as to whether some of the lack of suc- 
cess may not be due to the difficulties of enforcing a new 
curriculum rather than to defects inherent, for particular 
cases, in departmental work. This phase of the discussion 
makes the schools in which a lack of success is reported 
the central point of interest, and their subsequent develop- 
ment under this plan must lead to results which will be of 
great value. 

There is, however, a question somewhat divorced from the 
actual elementary school which is of great importance. This 
is, " What will be the effect of departmental teaching on the 
child when he has entered the high school where such a 
system of necessity prevails ? " In the past it has been found 
that the child, transferred suddenly from the " mothering" 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1903 235 

influence of the class-teacher plan of the elementary school 
into the high school's atmosphere of freer self-activity with 
its consequent insistence on greater self-responsibility, has 
found it most difficult to adjust his faculties to the novelty 
of being to a great extent his own master. In many cases 
it has taken nearly a full year, more or less wasted, for the 
child to become used to being responsible for himself in 
action instead of being to an extent the automaton moved 
at the behest of some person especially charged with his 
government throughout the school day. The problem of 
accommodation has, in not a few cases, proved too difficult, 
and the result has been that many children, dazed by free- 
dom, confused by liberty, perplexed by the necessity for 
self-settlement of questions, have grown disheartened and 
have left the high schools in the first year of their course. 
This is indeed a serious matter and one demanding solution. 
The only possible remedy seems to be to accustom the 
child, by degrees and in familiar surroundings, to a moderate 
amount of self-governing in his elementary school life. 
Will this prove to be a cure ? It is too early to say, because 
as yet no large number of departmentally trained children 
have entered the high schools. The only evidence is the 
hint here and there from schools in Queens and Richmond 
which have all grades, that the effect in high school is good. 
It would seem wise, therefore, to wait until this body of 
evidence from the secondary schools can be adduced and 
added pro or con to the score of departmental success or 
failure ere a final verdict be recorded. 

It is true that in most cases considered the interest of 
teachers has been greatly enhanced, and that their methods 
have shown the improvement to be expected of the spe- 



21,6 DEPARTMENTAL TEACHING 

cialist. It is true also that the interest of the children in a 
majority of cases has been augmented and that results which 
are all that could be desired have been obtained in a large 
number of schools. Discipline, save in rare instances, 
either has been improved or else has not suffered. Pen- 
manship seemingly is not entirely satisfactory, but the in- 
stances in which this is to be attributed, without question, 
directly to departmental work are not many. There is room 
for doubt whether the somewhat unsatisfactory results in 
this branch are not due in great part to a faulty method of 
departmental work, or to an unnecessary neglect of the 
subject. Certain it is that not a few have obtained very 
satisfactory results — a fact which seems to fix responsi- 
bility more or less upon the differing personalities of the 
teaching corps. Still there should be a further scrutiny of 
the teaching of this branch. 

These matters taken into consideration with the facts 
that the replies have come from schools dealing with all 
types of children and all sorts of racial and civic prob- 
lems, from schools in crowded districts, from schools in 
the open, from boys' schools, from girls' schools, from 
mixed schools, and that no principal employing the plan 
has convicted it unqualifiedly of worthlessness, all tend to 
optimism. The broader considerations, however, impel 
conservatism. In closing, therefore, I shall say merely 
that the results confirm me in my belief in this logical 
theory, now partly tried out, but do not seem to warrant 
radical confirmatory action. I recommend, therefore, that 
for a year at least the departmental system of teaching be 
not made compulsory in the last two years of the course ; 
that, in view of all the facts, the principals be permitted to 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1903 237 

introduce the system if they so desire ; and that the work- 
ings of these departments be scrutinized carefully for the 
next twelve months with a view to obtaining a body of 
data which will warrant definitive legislation. Of the out- 
come, however, I have little doubt. 



XXIV 
TEACHERS' SALARIES 

{From the Greater New York Report for igoy) 

THE year 1906-1907 will be memorable for an agitation 
carried on by the women teachers in elementary 
schools and high schools to secure legislation making it 
mandatory upon the Board of Education to pay the same 
salaries to women that are paid to men. 

For a full understanding of the facts and conditions out 
of which this agitation arose, it is necessary to state briefly 
the history of teachers' salaries in this city since consolida- 
tion. When consolidation took place in 1898, three city 
school systems, nearly a score of village school systems, 
and nearly one hundred rural school districts were brought 
together into one system. There was a different method of 
paying the teachers found in each of the component parts 
of the school system. The method of raising money for 
the support of schools, under the new charter, was such 
that the distribution of the fund for the payment of 
teachers' salaries among the various local organizations 
resulted, as many of them believed, in great injustice. We 
struggled along, however, for three or four years under 
very great financial difficulties, which caused serious injury 
to the school system and kept up constant irritation and 
agitation among the teaching force. These difficulties 

2 3§ 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 239 

reached their culmination in the school year 1899- 1900, 
when, for months, no salaries were paid to teachers in the 
boroughs of Queens and Richmond, when the salaries of 
many teachers were arbitrarily reduced in order that the 
salaries of other teachers, specially favored in a legislative 
enactment known as the Ahearn law, should be increased. 
So great was the unrest and so impossible did it seem to 
overcome the difficulties occasioned by the smallness of 
the appropriation and the rivalries of borough school 
boards that a comprehensive measure was introduced into 
the legislature by Senator Davis to regulate the entire 
subject of teachers' salaries in this city. Senator Davis's 
bill provided that a tax of four mills on each dollar of 
assessed valuation of real and personal property in the 
city should be levied for the purposes of the General 
School Fund, from which teachers' salaries are paid, and 
that certain minimum salaries should be fixed for the 
several classes of teachers. Unfortunately, the schedules 
of salaries provided by the Davis law were drawn up by a 
legislative committee after conference only with represent- 
atives of different teachers' organizations, and without 
reference to an harmonious underlying scheme or plan. 
The result is that the salary scheme contains many in- 
congruities and inequalities. While the salary schedules 
provided for minimum uniform salaries for each grade of 
teacher throughout the city, they were modeled chiefly 
upon the schedules that had prevailed in the old city 
of New York, and thus were made to provide considerably 
higher salaries for men teachers than for women teachers. 
For women teachers in elementary schools the schedules 
provided for one grade of salary for teachers teaching in 



240 



TEACHERS' SAEARTES 



any grade from the kindergarten to the 6B grade, inclu- 
sive ; a little higher salaries for those teaching grades of 
7 A, 7B, and 8A ; and a still higher salary for those teach- 
ing the 8B grade or graduating class. For men teachers, 
the bill provided two salary schedules for elementary 
schools : one for teachers of any grade below 8B ; the 
other, a higher salary, for teachers of the 8B grade or 
graduating class. In the case of principals of elementary 
schools, a difference of $1000 a year was made between 
the salary of a woman principal and the salary of a man 
principal. In the same way, salary schedules were pro- 
vided for women and for men in high schools. 

While it must be admitted by any one who has closely 
studied the subject that the Davis law is ambiguous in 
some of its provisions, and that it is unjust to women in 
many respects, it may also be successfully maintained that 
it put an end to an almost intolerable condition with 
regard to teachers' salaries. Certain it is that from 1900 
up to 1907 we enjoyed almost complete freedom from 
agitation for change or increase of salaries. Under these 
circumstances I cannot but regard the Davis law as having 
been of very great advantage to the schools. I sincerely 
trust that it will be maintained on the statute book as a 
defense against capricious changes in teachers' salaries, 
until something better is provided. 

It was almost inevitable, however, that sooner or later 
the women teachers would revolt against the discrimination 
in salary made against them by this law, and in favor of 
men. After much discussion between them and members 
of the legislature, a bill was finally agreed upon and 
introduced by Senator White, of Syracuse, the most im- 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 24 1 

portant provisions of which were : (1) that the educational 
tax of four mills established in the Davis law, which had 
afterwards been reduced to three mills, should be restored ; 
(2) that the principle of " equal pay for equal work " should 
be established by law ; and (3) that any officer or teacher 
who exercises supervisory duties over other teachers must 
receive a salary higher than any teacher supervised. 

This bill was passed by both houses of the legislature, 
was vetoed by Mayor McClellan, was then repassed by the 
legislature over the Mayor's veto, and was finally vetoed 
by Governor Hughes. 

Now that this agitation is over for the present, it is profit- 
able to consider briefly the main provisions of the pro- 
posed legislation and some fundamental principles which 
ought to be carefully taken into account in any revision of 
the law governing teachers' salaries. The most important 
provision of the proposed law was that requiring " equal 
pay for equal work." In support of this provision the 
argument made is that women frequently teach quite as 
well as men teach, and that some women teach a great 
deal better than some men teach — a statement which is 
undoubtedly true ; and second, that salary should attach 
to a position and should not depend upon the sex of the 
incumbent. These arguments containing, as they do, a 
considerable amount of truth, are very plausible and have 
won the support of many persons in the legislature and 
throughout the community in support of the principle of 
" equal pay for equal work." It must be pointed out, how- 
ever, that arguments such as these proceed solely from the 
teacher's point of view. They do not take into considera- 
tion either the ability of the taxpayer to pay increased 



242 TEACHERS' SALARIES 

salaries or the interests of the children in the schools. If 
there is to be "equal pay for equal work," it can come 
about in only one of two ways : either men's salaries must 
be reduced to the rate of salary paid to women, or women's 
salaries must be raised to the rate of salary paid to men. 
In the former case — a reduction of men's salaries — it is 
perfectly clear that we shall not be able in future to 
get strong men to enter the teaching profession in this city, 
and that the strong men who are now employed in the 
schools will leave and seek more remunerative employ- 
ment. Under such conditions only the weaklings among 
men would remain. If, on the other hand, the second 
alternative is taken and women's salaries are raised to the 
rate of salaries paid to men, the expense to the city will be 
enormous. According to calculations made by Auditor 
Cook, had Senator White's bill passed, the increased cost 
of teachers' salaries would have been between eight and 
nine million dollars for the present year. Owing to the 
recent disturbances in financial circles, it is now quite clear 
that the burden thus laid upon the taxpayers would have 
been greater than they could bear. It must also be perfectly 
clear that even if this financial disturbance had not occurred, 
so great an increase in the immediate cost of schools would 
prevent that extension of the school system every year 
which is necessary to meet the demands of an increasing 
population. It is difficult even at present rates of expendi- 
ture to secure sufficient funds to erect the additional build- 
ings and to pay the additional teachers needed to provide 
for an annual increase in the school population of 25,000 
children. If, then, equalization of salaries cannot be at- 
tained by raising women's salaries to an equality with men's 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 243 

salaries because of the enormous expense involved- — an 
expense which would oppress the taxpayers and eventually 
cripple the system ; and if equalization by reducing men's 
salaries to the rates paid to women would result in driving 
men teachers out of the system, the inquiry at once arises : 
What advantage is there in retaining men as class teachers 
in elementary schools ? 

In discussing this question, which is really a question of 
the relative merits of men and of women as teachers, I feel 
bound to say that it cannot be decided by any of the ordinary 
examination tests applied to determine the results of teach- 
ing. If the same examinations were given to twenty classes 
taught by twenty women teachers of average ability, and to 
twenty classes taught by twenty men teachers of average 
ability, in such a subject as arithmetic, or grammar, or ge- 
ography, I am confident from my observation in the schools 
that the results in the women's classes would be quite as 
good as the results in the men's classes. The question, if 
determined at all, must be determined by considerations 
other than examination tests. 

MEN AND WOMEN AS TEACHERS 

It will be admitted, I presume, that the prime object of 
education is not so much the imparting of knowledge as 
the development of character. If this proposition is con- 
ceded, the question arises : Is the influence of men teachers 
through example and natural characteristics on the de- 
velopment of character the same as the influence of women 
teachers, or is it something different ? This question again 
must be determined in the light of the general intellectual 
and emotional characteristics of men and of women. That 



244 TEACHERS' SALARIES 

the intellectual and emotional characteristics of men and of 
women are different is held by practically all students of 
psychology and sociology. What these differences are 
has been carefully examined and set forth by Mr. Herbert 
Spencer in his " Study of Sociology." The following pas- 
sage contains his general conclusions : — 

Admitting such to be changes which the future will probably see wrought 
out, we have meanwhile to bear in mind these traits of intellect and feeling 
which distinguish women, and to take note of them as factors in social phenom- 
ena — much more important factors than we commonly suppose. Consider- 
ing them in the above order, we may note, first, that the love of the helpless, 
which in her maternal capacity woman displays in a more special form than 
man, inevitably affects all her thoughts and sentiments; and this being joined 
in her with a less-developed sentiment of abstract justice, she responds 
more readily when appeals to pity are made than when appeals are made to 
equity. . . . 

The maternal instinct delights in yielding benefits apart from deserts, and 
being partially excited by whatever shows a feebleness that appeals for help 
(supposing antagonism has not been aroused) carries into social action this 
preference of generosity to justice, even more than men do. A further tend- 
ency having the same general direction, results from the aptitude which the 
feminine intellect has to dwell on the concrete and proximate rather than on 
the abstract and remote. The representative faculty in women deals quickly 
and clearly with the personal, the special, and the immediate ; but less readily 
grasps the general and the impersonal. A vivid imagination of simple direct 
consequences mostly shuts out from her mind the imagination of consequences 
that are complex and indirect. The respective behaviors of mothers and 
fathers to children sufficiently exemplify this difference, mothers thinking 
chiefly of present effects on the conduct of children, and regarding less the 
distant effects on their characters; while fathers often repress the promptings 
of their sympathies with a view to ultimate benefits. And this difference 
between their ways of estimating consequences, affecting their judgments on 
social affairs as on domestic affairs, makes women err still more than men do 
in seeking what seems an immediate public good without thought of distant 
public evils. Once more, we have in women the predominant awe of power 
and authority, swaying their ideas and sentiments about all institutions. This 
tends towards the strengthening of governments, political and ecclesiastical. 
Faith in whatever presents itself with imposing accompaniments, is, for the 
reason above assigned, especially strong in women. Doubt or criticism, or 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 245 

calling-in-question of things that are established, is rare among them. Hence 
in public affairs their influence goes towards the maintenance of controlling 
agencies, and does not resist the extension of such agencies; rather, in pur- 
suit of immediate promised benefits, it urges on that extension; since the con- 
crete good in view excludes from their thoughts the remote evils of multiplied 
restraints. Reverencing power more than men do, women, by implication, 
respect freedom less — freedom, that is, not of the nominal kind, but of that 
real kind which consists in the ability of each to carry on his own life without 
hindrance from others, so long as he does not. hinder them. 

If Mr. Spencer's conclusions are just : if women respond 
more readily to appeals to pity and men to appeals to 
equity; if women are guided more by generosity and men 
by justice; if women's minds dwell more on what is con- 
crete and proximate, and men's on what is abstract and 
remote ; if women see more clearly the simple, direct con- 
sequences of an act, while men are prone to consider the 
complex and indirect consequences ; if women realize pub- 
lic good that is immediate and men more clearly realize 
public ends that are remote ; if women stand more in awe 
of power and authority while men are given to criticism ; 
if women reverence power while men respect freedom, — it 
follows that children, girls as well as boys, should in their 
school work come under the influence of the mind of the 
man as well as of the mind of the woman. It is of the 
highest importance that each successive generation of men 
should, without losing the natural or acquired tendency to 
equity and justice, acquire more of the distinctively 
womanly characteristics of pity and generosity ; and that 
women, without losing their insight into what is immedi- 
ately beneficial and their reverence for power and authority, 
should acquire more of the distinctly manly characteristics 
of respect for freedom and insight into what is complex and 
remote. From the standpoint, therefore, of the develop- 



L^ 



246 TEACHERS' SALARIES 

ment of character in the pupil through that most powerful 
of all forces, imitation, it is necessary to have both men 
teachers and women teachers in the schools. 

No better illustration of the effect of men's influence on 
boys' minds through imitation need be given than the 
activities conducted under the direction of the Public 
Schools Athletic League, in which tens of thousands of 
boys are daily practicing athletic sports under the leader- 
ship of a few hundred men teachers. This result, beneficial 
from the moral and intellectual as well as the physical 
point of view, would, if only women teachers had been 
employed to teach boys, have been impossible. 

But this is not all. While the psychological argument 
derived from the characteristics of men and of women as 
set forth by Mr. Spencer is very strongly in favor of hav- 
ing men teachers in the schools, there is a social argument 
which is perhaps even stronger. A very large proportion 
of the children in our schools come from homes in which 
there is but little culture ; in many of which the English 
language is rarely spoken, and spoken poorly ; in many of 
which the husband and father is merely a breadwinner 
when he is not also a domestic tyrant. In such homes both 
boys and girls see little of the father and come to think of 
him in their daily life as one whose sole duty it is to toil, 
while he pays little, if any, attention to the graces and re- 
finements of life. If, when they go to the public school, 
they find only women as teachers, the impression made 
upon their minds is sure to be that culture and refinement 
are for women alone and not at all for men. Such an im- 
pression could have only a prejudicial effect, particularly 
upon the minds of boys. Insensibly but inevitably they 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 247 

would come to regard culture and refinement as things 
good enough perhaps for women folk, but unworthy of 
men, whom they conceive of as the toilers, the fighters, 
and the voters. If, however, they find in the public schools 
men teachers who, while possessing the characteristics of 
men of the world, have also acquired culture and refine- 
ment, boys naturally reach the conclusion that culture and 
refinement are worth while for men as well as for women. 
From this broad social point of view, therefore, it is cer- 
tainly for the interest of the community and for the in- 
tellectual and moral elevation of the race that we should 
have men teachers in the schools as well as women 
teachers. Experience has doubtless shown that women 
teachers teach younger pupils, boys as well as girls, better 
than men. At that age, however, at which boys begin to 
extend their intellectual horizon beyond the circle of child- 
ish amusements, it is preeminently necessary that they 
should have an opportunity of acquiring through imitation 
the characteristics of men as well as the characteristics of 
women, of following the example of men of character as 
well as the example of women, and of seeing in men as well 
as in women illustrations of culture and refinement. 

If the conclusion of the last paragraph, that the employ- 
ment of men in the schools is necessary, is valid, it follows 
that the educational authorities must pay salaries to men 
sufficient to obtain the requisite supply of men teachers of 
ability and culture. If, however, it is not necessary to pay 
the same salaries in order to obtain a sufficient supply of 
women teachers of refinement and culture, it is difficult to 
see what reason can be advanced for increasing the edu- 
cational expenses to the extent involved in equalizing the 



248 TEACHERS' SALARIES 

salaries of women teachers with those at present paid to 
men. 

For the sake of clearness the argument may be stated in 
a series of propositions : — 

1. The majority of the class teachers in the public 
schools are women, for two reasons : (a) for the younger 
children who constitute the larger number in the schools, 
women make the better teachers ; (b) the services of women 
teachers may be obtained more cheaply than those of men. 

2. Some men teachers are and should be employed in 
the higher grades for three principal reasons : {a) that the 
pupils may come under the influence of the intellectual 
and moral qualities that particularly characterize men, as 
well as under the influence of the intellectual and moral 
qualities that particularly characterize women ; (b) that the 
pupils may be made to feel that culture and refinement are 
not the peculiar province of women, but should also be 
striven for and possessed by men ; (c) that the larger boys 
may have guidance and leadership in athletic sports. 

3. In order to obtain the services of even a small num- 
ber of men, it has been found necessary to pay consider- 
ably higher salaries than those paid to women. 

4. Neither by any received economic theory nor by the 
analogy of any practice in any other walk of life, can it be 
regarded as sound policy to determine the salaries of the 
great majority (women) of the teaching force by the sala- 
ries paid to a comparatively few (men) who are employed, 
not because on the average they teach the ordinary school 
branches better than women do, but for special purposes. 

If, then, the salaries which it is found necessary to pay 
in order to obtain the services of a few men, are not to 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 249 

form the basis for the salaries of the majority of the teach- 
ing force who are women, what principles should determine 
teachers' salaries ? 

These principles seem to me to be two : — 

1. A teacher's salary should constitute a living wage. 
In the case of a teacher a living wage ought to be under- 
stood to mean a salary sufficient to enable the teacher to 
live in respectable society and to take advantage of reason- 
able means of culture and recreation. 

2. The salary should be such as to attract to the public 
schools of New York the best teaching talent in the 
country. 

After the most careful consideration I have been able to 
give this subject, I feel convinced that the salaries now 
paid to the majority of our teachers violate both of these 
principles. The classes of teachers whose salaries specially 
require readjustment are the following : — 

Women class teachers in elementary schools. 

Women principals in elementary schools. 

Special teachers of drawing and physical training in ele- 
mentary schools, both men and women. 

High school teachers, both men and women. 

The initial salary for women teachers in elementary 
schools is $600. An annual increase of $40 is given until, 
in seventeen years, the maximum of $1240 is reached, 
provided the teacher remains in any grade from the kin- 
dergarten to 6B. Considering the cost of living in New 
York City, I think it will be generally admitted that the 
salary of the first three years does not constitute a living 
wage in the sense in which I have defined the words. But 
this is not all. The Davis law provides three salary 



250 TEACHERS' SALARIES 

schedules for women teachers in elementary schools. The 
results of this arrangement have not been good. The 
plan of having three different salaries for women class 
teachers in elementary schools has resulted in much bitter 
feeling on the part of teachers in higher schedules who 
are transferred from one school to another whenever, as is 
frequently necessary, a consolidation of classes is made ; 
and it has operated to prevent principals from assigning 
their teachers to that work for which they are best fitted. 
I recommend, therefore, that as soon as money is available 
the initial salary for women teachers in elementary schools 
be made $720 per annum, and that the same maximum 
salary, to be reached in a given number of years, be pro- 
vided for all women class teachers. In further support of 
this recommendation, I feel constrained to say from my 
intimate acquaintance with the work of the Board of Ex- 
aminers, that the salaries now paid to women teachers are 
not sufficient to attract to our schools the best women 
teachers in the country. Even in the case of our own high 
school graduates, many of the most talented go to college 
in the hope of entering upon some more lucrative walk of 
life rather than that of elementary teaching. 

With regard to women principals, it must be quite clear 
to any one who is familiar with the work of the Board of 
Examiners that it is quite as difficult to obtain women 
principals of the requisite scholastic and professional at- 
tainments and executive ability as it is to obtain men 
principals. On this ground I recommend that as soon as 
money is available the salaries of women principals be 
equalized with those of men. 

It is becoming increasingly difficult to obtain a sufficient 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 25 1 

supply of supervising teachers of drawing and manual 
training and of physical training. The ablest members of 
the elementary corps of special teachers constantly find 
places in the high schools where the work is easier, less 
responsible, and better paid. Therefore, these salaries 
should be increased to attract a sufficient number of 
teachers of the right kind. 

If our high schools are to maintain the high standard 
they have reached, it is absolutely necessary to pay higher 
salaries in order to obtain the best available teachers. I 
make this statement, not because there is any diminution 
in the number of high school teachers applying to the 
Board of Examiners for places on the high school eligible 
lists, but because after the lists have been prepared those 
who stand foremost very frequently, I might almost say, 
as a rule, decline appointment in New York City because 
of the inadequacy of the salary paid. First-class secondary 
teachers find that they can make more money by teaching 
in smaller cities, even when the salary is not so large, be- 
cause living expenses are so much less. Not less than 
fifty of the ablest men and women whose names have been 
placed on the eligible lists for high schools have refused 
appointment in our city high schools during the past 
year. 

I understand fully that owing to financial conditions in 
this city there is no immediate possibility of increasing 
teachers' salaries as I have recommended. In view, how- 
ever, of the agitation of last year and in view of the urgent 
necessity for some action, as soon as practicable on the 
part of the financial authorities of the city and on the part 
of the Board of Education, I have judged it not inappro- 



2^2 TEACHERS' SALARIES 

priate to set forth some of the principles that ought to de- 
termine the adjustment of teachers' salaries with a view to 
increasing the efficiency of our schools. 

PLANS FOR THE PAYMENT OF TEACHERS IN NEW YORK 

CITY 

{From the Greater New York Report for igid) 

There is at present, and there has been for four or five 
years, widespread discontent among the city's public school 
teachers with respect to their salaries. There are two 
main causes : — 

First. An insistent agitation on the part of the women 
teachers for " equal pay for equal work." 

Second. A consensus of opinion on the part both of the 
public and of the teachers that the lowest salaries paid are 
no longer sufficient in view of the increased cost of living. 

The campaign for " equal pay for equal work," or, as 
the women teachers now prefer to put it, " payment for 
position," is so vigorous, so ably directed, and so persistent 
that it is increasingly apparent that in the end it will meet 
with some measure of success. The question at issue, 
therefore, is now, not whether the demands of the women 
teachers shall be granted, at least in part, but whether the 
form in which they shall be granted shall be so molded 
as to secure whatever advantages the new system promises, 
and at the same time to avoid whatever dangers it may 
portend. 

Three plans have been suggested for paying teachers 
so as to allay the present discontent and to discourage 
agitation. 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1910 253 

The first plan is to increase the wages of the women until 
they equal those of the men. As there are twelve times 
as many women teachers as there are men, the expense in- 
volved would be enormous. To equalize the salaries of 
women teachers with those of the men in the elementary 
schools would cost at least $10,000,000 per year on the 
basis of the present number of teachers. The expense 
would be so great that it would effectually prevent the 
legitimate and necessary expansion of the school system. 

The second plan is to reduce the salaries of the men 
teachers until they equal the present salaries of the women 
teachers. The result would be that the ablest of the men 
would leave the system, for they could easily secure higher 
salaries in other school systems or in other walks of 
life. Those who are charged with the management of 
the school system believe that the highest welfare of our 
children demands the presence of some men teachers 
in the classrooms. The fundamental grounds for this be- 
lief I stated with some degree of fullness in my Ninth 
Annual Report. It is not at all likely, therefore, that the 
elimination of men from the classrooms of the elementary 
schools will ever be permitted. Nevertheless, as there are 
only about one thousand men teachers in the elementary 
schools, and the plan of equalizing women's salaries up- 
wards would cost about $10,000,000 per year, it follows 
that to do so for the purpose of retaining the men would 
entail an added expense of $10,000 per year for each man 
— an excessive price to pay. 

The third plan is to base payment, not on the sex of the 
teacher, but on the sex of the pupils taught. This is the 
basis of the schedules recommended by the Commission on 



254 TEACHERS' SALARIES 

Teachers' Salaries. While nominally providing for pay 
for position, it really preserves, though in a somewhat les- 
sened degree, because of an increase in the salaries it is 
proposed to pay to teachers of girls' classes, the present 
disparity between the salaries of men teachers and those 
of women teachers. The women teachers have not been 
slow to see that this plan is a labored effort to " get round " 
their contentions, not to meet them squarely or to satisfy 
them, and have given voice to their belief in no uncertain 
tones. In addition to the fact that the Commission's plan 
would not satisfy the women teachers, allay discontent, and 
stop agitation, it is open to several grave objections. It 
would tend to increase the segregation of the pupils of the 
two sexes as distinguished from coeducation ; it would 
artificially restrain the natural evolution of the school sys- 
tem because in every step taken to organize a school, 
those in authority would be obliged to consider whether 
any and every measure taken would increase the cost of 
teaching through the presence of boys or girls or both in a 
class ; it would largely deprive the girl pupils of the advan- 
tages to be gained from being taught by men ; and it holds 
out no incentive to earnest endeavor on the part of teach- 
ers toward improvement, and offers no reward for merito- 
rious service. 

However the question be finally solved — and solved it 
must be if the education of the city's children is not to suffer 
severely — I beg leave to submit that the following princi- 
ples must be recognized in the solution : — 

i. The plan of payment should be of such a character 
as to stimulate industry on the part of teachers, encourage 
individual improvement, and reward exceptional merit. 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1910 255 

2. It should be of such a character as to permit the as- 
signment of every teacher to that position or kind of work 
which he or she can do best. It should be possible to place 
a teacher over any class in a public school where his or her 
services are required, without regard to the salary paid. Un- 
der the present system and under the system proposed by the 
Commission, this flexibility is entirely wanting. A teacher 
cannot be transferred from a grade commanding a higher 
salary to a grade commanding a lower salary unless he or 
she is found guilty of general inefficiency, gross misconduct, 
insubordination, or neglect of duty — an intolerable situa- 
tion. 

3. It should permit organization of schools and classes 
in the most effective and economical manner without reduc- 
ing the salary of any teacher or making necessary the 
transfer of teachers from one school to another. At pres- 
ent, if a teacher in the last two years -of the elementary 
course is found to be unnecessary because of a shrinkage 
in the number of pupils in the upper grades, it is necessary 
to transfer her to another school and place her in a corre- 
sponding grade. This transfer is usually made greatly to 
the displeasure of the teacher transferred, and wholly to the 
displeasure of the teachers in the school to which she is trans- 
ferred, one of whom is deprived of promotion. And dis- 
pleasure begets discontent and irritation — a frame of mind 
in which no teacher can teach well. 

If we bear in mind these three principles as essential to 
any scientific scheme of paying teachers, it will not be found 
impossible to formulate an effective working plan. A plan 
based on these principles will reimburse the city for any 
increased expenditure involved, because each increase in 



256 TEACHERS' SALARIES 

salary will indicate and will involve an improvement in 
service. 

Such a plan would be to pay all teachers according to a 
modified form of the Federal Civil Service system. Under 
this system teachers would be rated and paid as belonging 
to classes "A," " B," " C, v etc. There would be no sex 
distinction in requirements or wages. From Class A (the 
lowest class) to Class B, all teachers should be promoted 
as soon as they receive their permanent licenses. From 
Class B to Class C they might advance on the vote of the 
Board of Superintendents as to fitness and merit. Above 
that point, however, a special commission would be neces- 
sary, whose members could devote their entire time to the 
work. This commission would control, under the direction 
of the Board of Education, the number and qualifications 
of persons admitted to each higher grade of salary. The as- 
signment of teachers to classes, no matter how they were 
classified or under what grade of salary they were paid, 
should remain in the hands of the principals, subject only 
to approval by, and appeal to, the Board of Superintendents. 

Such a commission might be composed of three or five 
members, among whom your supervising officers would be 
represented. The other members might be principals 
assigned to the special work of the commission for a period 
of three or five years, and receiving during that time an 
added salary of $1000 a year over their regular salaries. 
One new member would be added each year and one old 
one returned to his regular place in the school system. 

In my Ninth Annual Report I advocated the payment of 
the same salaries to women principals that are paid to men 
principals. I still hold to this view. 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1910 257 

I submit this plan for your consideration and the con- 
sideration of the financial authorities of the city. I am 
confident that it will solve a problem which has hitherto 
appeared insoluble. While the schools would cost more 
than they do at present, the city would receive a full equiva- 
lent for the increased expenditure through the better service 
rendered by the teachers. 

Note. — The plan of paying teachers adopted by the Board of Education 
in May, 191 1, and afterward enacted into law was, in the case of high school 
teachers, founded on the plan proposed by Dr. Maxwell in his Report for 1910. 
Instead, however, of dividing teachers into classes as Dr. Maxwell proposed, 
and instead of an independent commission to determine the transition from 
one class to another, the Board of Examiners with the addition of a principal 
and a district superintendent are required to determine the possession of 
" superior merit " as a qualification for advance to the higher salaries. 

— The Editors. 



XXV 
THE BOARD OF EXAMINERS 

During his superintendency in Brooklyn, Dr. Maxwell had almost annually 
advocated the necessity for getting competent teachers by examination. It 
was in no small measure due to his influence that provision for an examination 
board was put into the first charter for the Greater City. — The Editors. 

(From the Greater New York Report for 1907) 

IN view of an attempt that has recently been made to 
secure, through the Charter Revision Commission, a 
reorganization of the Board of Examiners, it seems fitting 
to set forth in some detail the history, organization, and 
achievements of that body. 

The Board of Examiners was established by the Charter 
of 1897. It has remained unchanged in the personnel of 
its members since 1898, when it was first organized. Its 
members were nominated by the City Superintendent from 
an eligible list prepared, after a most searching examination, 
by the Civil Service Commission. These members have 
since been twice reelected, on the nomination of the City 
Superintendent, by the Board of Education. During these 
nine years they have passed upon the qualifications of 
thousands of teachers and made hundreds of eligible lists 
from which principals and teachers of all grades have been 
appointed. They have elevated the standard of scholar- 
ship and professional attainment required for entering the 

258 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 259 

teaching profession in this city. Not only so, but the con- 
duct of their work has incited the teachers in the schools to 
an amount of professional study to improve their efficiency 
which a few years ago would have been thought impossible. 
Through the wise and impartial exercise of the powers con- 
ferred upon them by law, every improper extraneous 
influence has been absolutely eliminated from the licensing 
of teachers in this city. Owing to their efforts the public 
school system of New York City now presents the most 
perfect illustration of the principles of civil service reform 
to be found in America. So fully has the Board of Ex- 
aminers justified its existence by its works, that many other 
cities have during the last four or five years established 
boards of examiners similarly organized and with similar 
powers. Among these cities are Newark, N.J. ; Buffalo, 
N.Y. ; Philadelphia, Pa. ; Washington, D.C.; and Chicago, 
111. Under these conditions, the reasons should be very 
powerful that would induce the legislature to modify or 
overturn so great a power for good. 

It has been proposed to " eliminate " the City Super- 
intendent from the Board of Examiners. I presume this 
expression means two things : to deprive the City Super- 
intendent of the right to nominate the members of the 
Board, and to remove him from its chairmanship. 

Against taking the power of nomination from the City 
Superintendent it may be urged that that power is an added 
guarantee for permanence of tenure during good behavior 
for the members of the Board. The members of the Board 
are compelled in the discharge of their duties to do many 
things, such as refusing licenses to unworthy or ill-prepared 
applicants, which render them peculiarly liable to attack. 



L- 



260 THE BOARD OF EXAMINERS 

Hence they are constantly exposed to the misrepresentation, 
to the malice, and to the revenge, not merely of individuals, 
but of institutions which do poor work in the preparation 
of their students, and even of political and other societies 
whose favorites may happen to fail at examination. Their 
absolute independence is the supreme need of the school 
system. They should never be made to feel that their 
positions may be endangered by the performance of a plain 
duty. Their tenure of office should be such that they will 
be raised above the injurious efforts of malignity and 
revenge. To a measurable extent nomination for reappoint- 
ment by the City Superintendent has given them this as- 
surance, because the City Superintendent is most fully 
acquainted with their work, its trials, and its results. If 
any change be made in the law governing the Board of 
Examiners, it should be to make the tenure of the present 
members the same as that of principals and teachers — 
permanent during good behavior. The work of an ex- 
aminer is comparable with that of a judge, and each should 
be safeguarded from injury while he does right, and should 
be held to a strict accountability if he does wrong. 

It has been said that, owing to his power of nomination, 
the City Superintendent dominates the members of the 
Board of Examiners who simply register his will. When 
it is remembered that the Board of Examiners examines 
annually more than 12,000 persons for teachers' licenses, 
the absurdity of this statement is apparent. In the nature 
of things, with his other multifarious duties, the City Super- 
intendent could not exercise the influence attributed to him. 
Apart from this, however, the statement is a gross libel 
upon both the City Superintendent and the other members 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1907 2 6 1 

of the Board. He has never attempted to exercise any 
influence in the Board of Examiners other than that which 
flows from legitimate argument and discussion ; nor are the 
members of the Board the kind of men either to exhibit 
subserviency or to tolerate dictation. 

As to the proposed removal of the City Superintendent 
from the chairmanship of the Board of Examiners, it may 
be claimed that his close connection with the Board has 
resulted in good in at least two ways : — 

1. The City Superintendent, being in close touch with 
the work of the schools and with the other administrative 
officers, has been able to keep the Board of Examiners also 
in close touch with the schools. A Board of Examiners 
which was not in close touch with the schools, which con- 
structed question papers that were too theoretical, or that 
led in directions opposed to the educational policy of the 
Board of Superintendents, would be a much less useful 
body than the Board of Examiners has been, and might 
even become a dangerous body. This is not an idle sup- 
position. We have had just such an experience. From 1898 
to 1902, the Board of Examiners had no official link with 
the Borough Boards of Superintendents which nominated 
teachers. It was to avoid the bickering and working at 
cross 'purposes which characterized school administration 
during those years that the City Superintendent was made 
by law the connecting link between the licensing authority 
and the administrative power. The harmony and good will 
which immediately resulted justify fully the continuance of 
this policy. The question papers of the Board of Examiners 
constitute not only effective tests, but standards of work, in 
harmony with the general policy of the school system. 



262 THE BOARD OF EXAMINERS 

Again, it is argued that the appointing power and the 
examining power should not be identical. The efficacy of 
this principle is more than doubtful. The position might 
be successfully defended that civil service examinations 
would be more searching, and better adapted to practical 
needs, if appointing officers had some voice in their con- 
struction. It is sufficient here, however, to point out that 
the City Superintendent is not part of the appointing 
power. The appointing power is lodged in the Board of 
Education. 

Furthermore, the City Superintendent through his official 
position has been able to reenforce the work of the Board 
of Examiners by bringing to bear, when necessary, the 
expert knowledge of the District Superintendents and 
Directors of Special Branches. Their aid has not only 
enabled the Board of Examiners to get through an amount 
of work which otherwise would have been impossible ex- 
cept at enormous expense, but has added greatly to the 
value of the work, and has reacted most beneficially on the 
efficiency of all concerned. It is by this means, in no 
small degree, that the examinations for principals' and 
assistant principals' licenses have become real tests of 
teaching and supervisory power and standards of attain- 
ment. Were the City Superintendent removed from the 
Board of Examiners, such cooperation would inevitably 
cease. 

For these reasons it is submitted that the Board of 
Examiners should remain as it was organized in 1898, 
except so far as to give its members permanent tenure of 
office during good behavior. 



XXVI 

"MERGING" OF ELIGIBLE LISTS 

{From the Greater New York Report for J<pu) 

UNDER the interpretation given by the courts to the 
language of the charter it has been decided that it is 
the function of the City Superintendent to place the 
names of those to whom licenses have been granted on 
the appropriate eligible lists. Since 1902 the names have 
been placed on the eligible lists in the order of standing at 
examination without regard to the date of the examination 
or the date of the license. This practice is what is known 
in popular phrase as the "merging" of the eligible lists, 
because when a new examination is held, if any persons on 
the preexistent list remain without appointment, their 
names are placed on the new list in accordance with their 
old standings. It thus happens that we invariably nomi- 
nate and appoint those persons who have the highest 
examination standings. The assumption underlying this 
practice is that those who pass the examinations with the 
higher standings are the persons of larger intellectual 
ability and are therefore more likely to prove efficient 
teachers. This assumption I believe to be well founded. 
The tests applied by the Board of Examiners to applicants 
for license as grade teacher, for instance, are so thorough 
that they cannot fail to disclose ability on the one hand 
and weakness on the other hand. There is first an exami- 

263 



264 "MERGING" OF ELIGIBLE LISTS 

nation in the history and principles of education to dis- 
cover whether the applicant is capable of holding and 
defending educational theory founded on logic, psychology, 
physiology, and the practice of the great teachers. Then 
comes an examination in English grammar and literature 
and methods of teaching English, as the most vital part 
of the elementary curriculum. This is supplemented by 
a rigid examination in methods of teaching the other 
" common branches," particularly arithmetic. Then come 
practical tests in the teaching of singing, sewing, physical 
training, and drawing. The most important part of the 
examination, however, is the oral examination in which 
the use of oral English, the power to read with accuracy 
and expression and to interpret perspicuously what is read, 
and personality, are determined. And finally, a careful 
search is made of the applicant's record as a student and a 
teacher to discover any reason why he or she should not 
succeed as a teacher. It goes almost without saying that 
the applicant who attains, as the combined result of all 
these tests, a final standing of 80 per cent is a person of 
more liberal culture and more powerful intellect, and 
therefore likely to be a better teacher, than a person who 
receives only 70 per cent, which has hitherto been the 
lowest passing mark for women. Knowing as I do the 
extreme care with which these examinations are conducted, 
I have no hesitation in taking the position, which is amply 
verified by after experience in actual teaching, that the 
higher the examination standing, the greater is the prob- 
ability of success in the classroom. Such is the chief argm 
ment in favor of " merging " eligible lists. But it is far 
from being the only argument. What would happen in 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 191 1 265 

case the list resulting from a new examination is not 
merged with the remains of the list resulting from preced- 
ing examinations ? Why, inferior teachers (speaking rela- 
tively) would receive appointments before superior teachers 
are reached. The injustice of this practice to the children 
of the city is manifest. But this is not all. Because it 
has been known and promised that those who have the 
higher examination standings shall be appointed first, 
large numbers of the ablest young men and young women 
in our high schools have entered our training schools and 
colleges to prepare for the teaching profession because 
they knew that they would not be obliged to wait any 
great length of time for appointment. Did they know 
that they would be obliged to wait a long time for appoint- 
ment, they would inevitably seek some other walk in life, 
and thus their abilities and accomplishments would be lost 
to the schools. In the same way many first-rate teachers 
from outside the city have taken our examinations because 
they knew that their own merits would secure immediate 
appointment. If, through failure to " merge " lists, this 
understanding is withdrawn, it is idle to expect that high 
class teachers of experience will participate in the competi- 
tive examinations in our city. The net results of abandoning 
the practice of "merging" lists would be twofold: (1) to 
appoint inferior teachers in preference to superior teachers ; 
(2) to cut off the supply of superior teachers, both those from 
our own schools and teachers of experience elsewhere, and 
to confine our eligible lists to the names of inferior or 
mediocre teachers. Could a policy more blighting to the 
schools, more injurious to the children of the city, be fol- 
lowed than to deprive them of the ablest teachers attainable ? 



266 "MERGING" OF ELIGIBLE LISTS 

It is sometimes argued in the case of those whose names 
have stood for some time, say two or three years, on the 
eligible lists without appointment, that their experience as 
substitutes makes them the equals of those superior in 
ability and education. This is a very doubtful proposition, 
because experience in teaching may have, and often does 
have, the effect of accentuating defects rather than of 
improving skill. Many of the poorest teachers in our 
schools, as is well known, have had the longest experience. 
It is quality, not quantity, of experience that tells. Experi- 
ence in teaching under careful and enlightened supervi- 
sion makes for improvement in the apprentice teacher. 
Experience under negligent or ignorant supervision 
generally tends to deepen faults and confirm bad habits. 
The length of experience, therefore, unless we know the 
kind of experience and under what kind of supervision, 
counts for but little in determining the standing of a 
teacher. There is, however, some justice in this claim for 
a rating on experience obtained by substituting after the 
name has been placed on the eligible list, because there is 
always some presumption in favor of the augmentation of 
skill through exercise. Due weight may be given to such 
experience, not by exhausting the eligible lists in chrono- 
logical order, but by re-rating periodically those who have 
had experience as substitutes. To do this equitably, how- 
ever, some means must be devised (i) to give each teacher 
unemployed an equal chance with all others similarly 
situated to show her ability as a teacher; and (2) to have 
the teaching experience thus gained directed and valued 
by supervisors who may be held directly responsible for 
their direction and their judgments. 



XXVII 

THE GROWTH OF THE NEW YORK CITY 
SCHOOLS FROM 1 900-1910 

{From the Greater New York Report for igio) 

AS the decennial census of the United States has just 
been taken, it will not seem out of place to compare 
the growth of our school system with the growth of our 
city's population during the past ten years. 

REGISTER AND ATTENDANCE IN ALL PUBLIC SCHOOLS 
FROM 1 899- 1 900 TO 1 909-1910 



School Year 



Average 
Register 



Average 
Attendance 



1 899- 1 900 
I900-I901 
I90I-1902 
I 902- I 903 
I 903- I 904 
I 904- I 905 
1905-1906 
1906-1907 
I 907-I 908 
I 908- I 909 
1909-1910 



418,951 
439,811 
459,841 

495, °4 5 
530.638 

55 1 * 106 
568,130 

591,653 

617,341 

639,323 

659,495 



378,211 
397,928 
420,480 
439,928 
466,571 
487,005 

5°5> S2 7 
523,084 

545, 98 
574,664 
586,673 ' 



In the year 1900 the average register in all of the pub- 
lic day schools of New York City amounted to nearly 

267 



2 68 GROWTH OF THE NEW YORK CITY SCHOOLS 

420,000. Ten years later it had grown until it almost 
reached 660,000. The growth during the decade was 
240,000, or almost a quarter of a million. The actual 
figures showing both the average register and the average 
attendance for each school year from 1899-190010 1909- 
19 10 are shown in the table on page 267. 

The increase in the average register of 1910 over that of 
1900 was 240,544, or 57 per cent. The average annual 
increase for each of the ten years was 24,054, and the aver- 
age annual rate of increase 4.6 per cent. When the figures 
are reduced to graphic form, as in the following diagram, 
it is impressive to note the steady and rapid increase year 
by year in the number of children in our public schools. 

700,000 

1908 r lfl 
600,000 - „ 1907 

1904 



500,000 



400,000 



300,000 



200,000 



100,000 



Scale 



1910 



1905 



1906 



1903 



1901 



1902 



Average register in all day schools in New York each year from 
1901 to 1910 inclusive. 



POPULATION INCREASE VS. SCHOOL INCREASE 

In the year 1900 the population of New York City was 
less than three and a half million ; ten years later it was 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 1910 269 

more than four and three quarter million, a gain during 
the decade of one and one third million. In exact figures, 
the population in 1900 was 3,437,202 ; ten years later it 
was 4,766,883, and the increase during this period was 
1,329,681, or 39 per cent. 

Now, since the city gained 39 per cent in population 
during the decade, and the schools gained 57 per cent in 
the same time, it is evident that the schools are growing 
much more rapidly than the city. A comparison of the 
two sets of figures shows that going to public school was 
the customary occupation of 12 people out of every 100 in 
New York's population in the year 1900J and that ten 
years later it was the customary occupation of 14 people 
out of every 100. 

The figures show not only that the school system is tak- 
ing each year a relatively more important place in the 
everyday life of the city, but that public education is al- 
ready an interest engrossing the attention of more people 
than any other single set of interests in the municipality. 
According to the Federal census of 1900, the occupation 
employing the greatest number of individuals in New 
York was the inclusive one embracing servants and waiters, 
who at that time numbered 135,000. That is to say, these 
occupations included between two and three people in 
every hundred. The figures for the public schools show 
more than mere increase ; they show that the business of 
education is the greatest, as it is the oldest, organized 
industry in New York City. How important it is, as well 
as something of the way it is growing, is shown in the two 
following diagrams, in which the large squares in outline 
represent the numbers of people in New York City at the 



270 GROWTH OF THE NEW YORK CITY SCHOOLS 




POPULATION OF NEW YORK CITY IN 1900 (100,000 TO THE SQUARE) 




POPULATION OF NEW YORK CITY IN 1910 (100,000 TO THE SQUARE) 
ELEMENTARYPUPILSIIJHIGH SCHOOL PUPILSH1 TEACHERS 



iRE) 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 19 10 271 

beginning and the end of the decade, the interior squares 
with single diagonal crosshatching the number of pupils 
enrolled in the day elementary schools, the interior squares 
with double crosshatching the number of pupils enrolled 
in the high schools, and the interior squares in solid black 
the number of school teachers. 



GROWTH OF THE DIFFERENT KINDS OF SCHOOLS 

Not all kinds of schools have grown with equal rapidity. 
High schools have increased more rapidly than elementary 
schools and training schools more rapidly than high schools. 
Moreover, the teaching force has gained faster than the 
school system as a whole. Ten years ago, three people in 
each thousand of the city's population were enrolled in the 
high schools. Provision for secondary education has so 
increased during the decade that at the present time six 
people in every thousand are enrolled in the high schools. 

If we include in the teaching force of the city, all of the 
regular and special teachers, principals, and supervising 
officers, and on this basis compare the teaching force with 
the number of pupils enrolled in all schools, we find that 
ten years ago there were forty-three children to each 
teacher; during the decade the number of teachers has 
increased until there are now only thirty-seven pupils for 
each teacher. 

The exact figures showing the number of pupils regis- 
tered in the elementary day schools, in the day high 
schools, and in the training schools, together with the 
teaching force of the city, for each year, are shown in the 
following table : — 



272 GROWTH OF THE NEW YORK CITY SCHOOLS 

AVERAGE REGISTER IN ELEMENTARY, HIGH, AND TRAINING 
SCHOOLS, AND TOTAL TEACHING AND SUPERVISING 
FORCE FROM 1900-19 10, INCLUSIVE 





Elementary 


Day High 


Training 


Teaching 




Day Schools 


Schools 


Schools 


Force 


1899-1900 .... 


407,245 


11,706 


* 


9,839 


I 900-1 901 . 








426,353 


i3>45 8 


475 


IO,735 


1901-1902 . 








444P45 


I5»*85 


611 


12,069 


I 902-1 903 . 








477>369 


17,065 


611 


12,696 


I 903- I 904 . 








5 1 2,5 70 


19,33° 


758 


13,327 


I 904-1 905 . 








5 2 9437 


20,770 


899 


13,777 


I 905- I 906 . 








545'420 


2i,493 


1,217 


14,548 


I 906-1 907 . 








5 6 7^59 


22,931 


1,463 


15,613 


I 907- I 908 . 








590,364 


25,264 


1,713 


16,489 


I 908- I 909 . 








606,568 


30,762 


i,993 


I7,073 


1909-1910 . 








622,048 


35> io 7 


2,169 


I7,7 2 4 



* Figures not available. 



If we call the population of the city ten years ago 100 
per cent, and in the same way call the registration in the 
elementary schools and the number of people in the teach- 
ing force 100 per cent at the same time, we can compute, 
and graphically illustrate, as in the following diagram, the 



200/. 



10$ 



1901 1902 1903 1904 1905 1906 1907 1908 1909 1910 




T.180* 

R.i5r^ 

P.139£ 



The lowest line shows that population (P) has increased 39 per cent during the 
decade ; the middle line that registration in all schools (R) has increased 57 per 
cent ; the upper line that the teaching force (T) has increased 80 per cent. 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 191 o 



2 73 



increases in terms of percentages which have taken place 
during the decade. The heavy lines show what increases 
have been made in population, school registration, and 
teaching force year by year, and how the last two have in- 
creased more rapidly than the population. 

Following the same plan, we are enabled to compare the 
growth in the population of the city, registration in the ele- 
mentary day schools, registration in the high schools, and reg- 
istration in the training schools, all in terms of percentages. 





1901 


1902 


1903 


1904 


1905 


1906 


1907 


1908 


1909 


1910 


4-Ofk 






















300* 
200* 






























































100fr 



























T.457* 



H.300* 



E.153* 
P.139* 



The lowest line shows that population (P) has increased 39 per cent during the 
decade; the second line that registration in the elementary day schools (E) 
has increased 53 per cent; the third line that registration in high schools (H) 
has increased 200 per cent. The upper line shows that registration in training 
schools (T) has increased 357 per cent in nine years. 



274 



GROWTH OF THE NEW YORK CITY SCHOOLS 



Here the differences in the rate of increase are even 
greater than those shown in the preceding diagrams. In 
terms of percentages, the increases for the decade and the 
average increase per year are as follows : — 

PERCENTAGE INCREASE FROM 1900-1910 



Increase during 
Decade 



Average Increase 
Each Year 



Population of city 
Elementary day schools 
All day schools 
Total teaching force . 
Day high schools . 
Training schools . 



39% 
53% 
57% 
80% 
200% 

357% 



3-3% 
4.3% 
4.6% 
6.1 % 

ii.7% 
18.7% 



When any given quantity increases through a series of 
years by a given percentage each year, its direction in its 
progress upward, when plotted on a diagram, is not a 
straight, but a curved line. That is to say, although the 
per cent of progress remains constant, there is each year a 
new base on which the percentage is computed, and hence 
the amount of gain is each year greater than it was 
the year before. If we plot such lines, showing the 
rate of increase in the city's population, teaching 
force, and each separate kind of school, we have a 
diagram with a series of curved lines showing the rate 
at which each separate item has been increasing during 
the past decade. These rates of increase are expressed 
in figures showing how many years it takes the popula- 
tion and each branch of the school system to * double 
in size. 



GREATER NEW YORK REPORT, 19 10 275 

1901 1902 1903 1904 1905 1906 1907 1908 1909 1910 



Tr. 4.0 Yrs. 



500* 



4m 



to 



200fc 



100^ 



H. 6.3 Yrs. 



T. 12.8 Yrs. 

E. 17.6 Yrs. 

P. 21.5 Yrs. 



Diagram showing how the population and each branch of the school system are 
doubling in size according to the rate of development maintained during the 
past decade. Thus, at these rates population (P) doubles every 21.5 years; 
elementary schools (E) double every 17.6 years ; teaching force (T) doubles 
every 12.8 years; high schools (H) double every 6.3 years; and the training 
schools (T ") double every 4.0 years. 

In round numbers, the rates of progress have been as 
follows : — 

Population of city doubling in size every 21.5 years 
Elementary day schools doubling in size every 17.6 years 
Total teaching force doubling in size every 12.S years 
Day high schools doubling in size every 6.3 years 
Training schools doubling in size every 4.04 years 



276 GROWTH OF THE NEW YORK CITY SCHOOLS 

It is evident that these rapid rates of increase cannot 
long continue, for should they do so, the city would soon 
be seriously oversupplied with schools. What they mean 
is that during the last decade our city has been making a 
determined and successful effort to catch up with her edu- 
cational needs. Hereafter, it may be expected, growth 
will be less rapid. It will be necessary, not so much to 
supply deficiencies caused by lack of enterprise or lack of 
money in the past — that has been the gigantic task of the 
decade just closed — as to enhance the intrinsic value of 
public education. Our policy hereafter should be, while 
never neglecting necessary growth, to make not growth 
but efficiency our chief aim. 

I submit, however, that, though excessive rapidity in 
growth is the chief foe of efficiency, the fact that the 
school attendance has increased so much more rapidly than 
population is conclusive evidence that the people appreciate 
the efforts that have been made, amidst unparalleled 
difficulties, to improve our schoolhouses, to elevate our 
standards of teaching, and to render the school life of our 
children more happy and more profitable. 



XXVIII 
CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

We understand that Dr. Maxwell's views have undergone some modifica- 
tions, particularly with regard to the course of study and to the licensing and 
appointment of teachers since this paper was prepared. It is printed as it 
was delivered, however, because it lays down the broad lines along which 
educational administration has since advanced in the cities of the United 
States. — The Editors. 

(A paper read before the Department of Superintendence of the National Edu- 
cational Association in New York, February, i8go) 

WERE society perfect, there would be no need of pub- 
lic schools. When society becomes perfect, there 
will probably be no public schools. When in the progress 
of evolution men shall reach that condition in which the 
liberty of each individual shall be bounded only by the 
liberty of every other individual ; when the human intellect 
shall attain such development that all men shall desire edu- 
cation for themselves and for their children, and, desiring 
it, shall know what is the best kind of education, and how 
best to obtain it ; and when such a balance between ego- 
istic and altruistic sentiments shall be established that the 
childless shall regard it as an injustice to pay for the educa- 
tion of other people's children, and those who have children 
shall equally regard it as injustice to receive assistance 
from those who have no children, — when all these things 
shall come to pass, then, and not till then, can public 
schools be dispensed with. 

277 



278 CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

That this stage of civilization will not be reached in our 
time, may be safely asserted. Indeed, in the present age 
and in the existing stage of social evolution, it may be 
confidently maintained that education is one of the chief 
duties, if not the chief duty, of the government. 

This country has passed through the militant stage. No 
longer is it necessary to expend the resources of the peo- 
ple on expensive armaments to defend the nation from the 
encroachments of foreign nations, or from the still more 
dreadful evils of fratricidal strife. We have reached that 
advanced industrial type in which the chief business of 
government is not either to be an aggressor or to ward off 
aggression, but to defend each citizen from the invasion of 
his rights by any other citizen. The development of the 
individual is now the great desideratum. It is an axiom of 
political ethics that a society is not more advance^ in the 
scale of civilization than are the units of which it is com- 
posed. If individuals are ignorant and vicious, it matters 
not what are the laws and institutions, the society will be 
low in the scale of civilization. It follows, therefore, that 
the most important business of government in this advanced 
industrial type is the development, intellectual, moral, and 
physical, of the individual. In these facts lies the raison 
d'etre of public education. The government that does not 
educate must either give place to a better government, or it 
will inevitably fall before a worse. 

THE EVOLUTION OF SOCIETIES 

So much may be inferred from the evolution of social 
and political institutions in the past. Two great forces 
have been at work — integration and differentiation. In 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1890 279 

the initial stages we find small groups bound together by 
actual or supposed descent from a common ancestor. The 
necessities of attack and defense supply the motive for union . 
One primitive group unites with another primitive group, 
and the resultant group is compounded and recom- 
pounded with other groups, always under the pressure of 
aggression or repulse of an aggressor, until loose aggre- 
gations of savages, bound together by family ties, are 
formed into great nations, in which individuals are no 
longer bound together by consanguinity, either real or 
fictitious, but by the mutual dependence of citizens. 

Hand in hand with this process of integration, but always 
dependent upon it, goes the process of differentiation. 
The chief, the superior few, and the inferior many, are 
early separated by broad lines of demarcation. The chief, 
the superior few, and the inferior many of the smaller 
groups develop into the king, the nobles, and the people 
of the larger aggregation. The contentions that arise 
among the three classes necessitate, in the presence of a 
common foe, the resignation of rights once claimed by 
the privileged classes, while the density of population and 
the increase of wealth consequent upon industrialism serve 
still further to weaken class distinctions. Social or tribal 
political assemblies become subordinate to a central politi- 
cal assembly. This body, which originally possessed legis- 
lative, political, and executive powers and functions, gradu- 
ally throws off the judicial and executive powers, which 
become vested in separate bodies, and finally all political 
bodies become either directly or indirectly of representative 
origin. 

The formula for the evolution of societies, thus briefly 



280 CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

and imperfectly summarized from Mr. Herbert Spencer, 
may be stated in these words : Societies which are small, 
loose, uniform, and vague in structure, develop into societies 
which are large, compact, multiform, and distinct in struc- 
ture. To this may be added the further fact that each new 
differentiation of structure is accompanied by a specializa- 
tion of function. Not only is this so in the three great 
branches of government, but it is so in all the agencies that 
serve for the protection and distribution of wealth, in all 
the agencies that lead to the moral, intellectual, and physi- 
cal progress of the human race. In everything, differenti- 
ation of structure and specialization of function is the law 
of progress. 

APPLICATION OF THE FORMULA OF EVOLUTION TO EDUCA- 
TIONAL ADMINISTRATION 

This bald and meager statement of the evolution of soci- 
eties is given, because it not only supplies the reason for 
the existence of public education, but also indicates the lines 
upon which any scheme of public education must be for- 
mulated, if it is to serve the purposes for which it is intended. 
If the most advanced type of political organization is that 
in which all governmental agencies, executive, legislative, or 
judicial, are directly or indirectly representative of the will 
of the people, the inference is inevitable that, to maintain 
such a system of government, the individuals of which 
society is composed must be adequately educated to the 
performance of this great trust. The functions of the 
American citizen, as Mr. James Bryce has pointed out in 
"The American Commonwealth," are far more complicated, 
delicate, and difficult than the corresponding functions of 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1890 281 

the citizen of any European country. There, the duty of 
the citizen is confined to the choosing of legislators, who 
are left to settle issues of policy and select executive rulers. 
Here, on the other hand, the citizen is virtually one of the 
governors of the republic. The election of legislators is 
only a small part of his duties. By popular vote executive 
rulers are selected and all great issues are determined. 
The proper performance of these weighty duties assumes 
on the part of the citizen an amount of knowledge and an 
amount of intelligence not required in the European citizen. 
That this knowledge and this intelligence are still far from 
universal — in other words, that the public schools have 
only partially performed their functions — is only too 
certainly demonstrated by the existence everywhere of a 
class of professional politicians, a class that is to be found 
in both the great political parties, who exercise a real rule 
that too often renders the rule of the people only a name. 
Had the public schools succeeded in imparting the neces- 
sary information and developing the necessary intelligence 
in the people, the power of the professional politician 
either to nullify or to form the will of the people would 
have been much less than it is at present. 

It is not true, of course, that all the evils the body 
politic is heir to, owe their existence to defects in the 
system of public education. Every educator knows that 
evil in the environment and hereditary propensity to 
wrongdoing are constant quantities against which he has 
to contend. They are powers of darkness that will, despite 
all his efforts, too often nullify the good effects of his 
work. But the question is : Which is gaining ground — 
the evil, or the good ? This question I shall not undertake 



282 CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

to determine. It is enough for us to know that the profes- 
sional politician is more firmly intrenched than ever. It is 
enough for us to know, that, in proportion to the increase 
in the urban population, insanity and crime increase. 
It is enough for us to know that the common enemies 
are not diminishing in strength, to cause us to look 
well to the joints of our armor, and to search in the 
ancient arsenals of history and philosophy for the 
weapons with which to combat the hosts of ignorance 
and evil. 

He would be, indeed, a dull observer who did not see 
that educators have already commenced this search. Our 
higher institutions of learning are beginning to recognize 
the fact that the highest duty of a university is to teach 
the science of teaching. Superintendents, principals, and 
teachers are beginning to study the principles of education 
and to deduce their methods from the premises afforded 
by a rational psychology. The spirit of reform, the spirit 
of progress, has seized the ranks of the educational army. 
There is a ferment of thought, a striving after what is 
better, that bodes nothing but good to our country. All 
this is well — so far. But of what avail is enthusiasm in 
an army when proper organization is wanting ? The raw 
recruits who ran away at Bull Run were every whit as 
brave as the men who withstood the desperate charges at 
Gettysburg. Organization, discipline, made the difference 
between the recruit and the veteran. Organization and 
discipline are as necessary to success in the educational 
field as in the military. Without scientific organization 
and proper discipline, wisdom and enthusiasm cannot 
accomplish their perfect work. The plans of wisdom 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1890 2 &$ 

will be weakened by the wiles of the wicked, and enthu- 
siasm will be dampened by the mists of ignorance. 

What then should be the plan of organization ? How is 
requisite discipline to be introduced ? Organization can 
come only along the lines on which progress has been made 
in all social institutions — integration first, and then differ- 
entiation of structure and specialization of function. The 
surrender at Appomattox Court House rendered political 
integration complete. Differentiation of structure and 
specialization of function have proceeded so far on the 
political side that the legislative, judicial, and executive 
departments of government, both in the national and in 
the state governments, are now more clearly separated and 
more closely confined to their special functions than in any 
other country on the face of the earth. But how is it with 
the work of public education? Has it become in like pro- 
portion differentiated in structure and specialized in func- 
tion ? The law, as stated by Mr. Spencer, is : " Be it in an 
animal or be it in a society, the progress of organization is 
constantly shown by the multiplication of particular struc- 
tures adapted to particular ends. Everywhere we see the 
law to be, that a part which originally served several pur- 
poses and achieved none of them well, becomes divided 
into parts each of which performs one of the purposes, and, 
acquiring specially adapted structures, performs it better." 
Do our state, do our city, public school systems, answer in 
structure and in function to the requirements of this law ? 
Judged by the standard set up by the philosophy of history, 
our public school systems are yet in the stage of semibar- 
barism. The state has, in the management of city systems, 
practically abdicated its powers, and ignored its functions. 



284 CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

It confers upon municipalities, it is true, through charters, 
the power of maintaining and managing public schools ; 
but it has established no authority to compel municipalities 
to administer educational affairs on the lines of scientific 
progress. It has established and it maintains normal 
schools, but it has not made normal schools effective by 
requiring that every teacher should have a professional 
education. It has enacted that it shall be compulsory upon 
every citizen to educate his children, but it has not provided 
adequate machinery to enforce the law, nor adequate penal- 
ties to punish its violation. The state, therefore, is not 
performing the functions which, legally and morally, it is 
bound to perform. 

On the other hand, city boards of education, nay, even 
the trustees of country schools, have thrust upon them 
duties and functions which, in the nature of things, they 
are incapable of performing to the best advantage of the 
community. The board of education is made responsible 
not only for the management and disbursement of educa- 
tional revenues, the selection and purchase of school sites, 
and the building of schoolhouses, but also for the making 
of the course of study, the selection of textbooks, and the 
appointment, and in many places the licensing, of teachers. 
Is this in accord with the law that " A part which originally 
served several purposes and achieved none of them well, 
becomes divided into parts each of which performs one of 
the purposes, and, acquiring specially adapted structures, 
performs it better" ? Is it not evident that we are still in 
that primitive condition wherein one part of the organism 
— the board of education — serves several purposes and 
performs none of them well ? 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1890 285 

An objector may reply : Does not the board of education 
employ school officers, a superintendent, a clerk, principals 
of schools, and the like, to whom it commits in greater or 
less degree the duties with which it is legally charged ? 
Quite true; but it is a principle of human nature that per- 
formance without responsibility is unequal to performance 
with responsibility. The functions of school officers are 
for the most part advisory. Their best efforts may be nul- 
lified by the caprice or ignorance of those who hold the 
reins of authority. Under such a system the strongest and 
wisest of men may well grow weary of well-doing, and, in- 
stead of leading the vanguard of progress, content himself 
with trying to avert the dangers that continually threaten 
our public schools. Under such a system, the strongest 
and wisest of educators may be pardoned if he degenerates 
into a not ignoble specimen of arrested development. 

But while evolution points out to us the path of all true 
progress, it also admonishes us that real progress is of slow 
growth, and warns us not to destroy before we are ready to 
build up. There is no truth more certain or more univer- 
sal than that, in every opinion that has obtained wide cre- 
dence, even though it seems to be absolutely wrong, there 
is yet in the ultimate analysis something that is supremely 
right ; that in every institution, no matter how little differ- 
entiated in structure, there are yet the germs of all subor- 
dinate structures, whose full development is necessary to 
the performance of certain functions. And so it is with 
our educational system. In the first place, we have the fact 
that the system is either directly or indirectly representa- 
tive of the people. This is in accord with what the evo- 
lution philosophy tells us is necessary to progress in the 



286 CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

most advanced industrial type of society. Again, in the 
existence of state boards of education and state superin- 
tendents, we find evidence of the fact that the state still 
preserves the semblance of control over the public schools, 
even though it has lost, or never possessed, or possesses 
only in a partial degree, the reality of such control. 

And yet again, in the existence of superintendents, sup- 
ervising principals, and other officers to whom boards of 
education delegate certain powers of supervision, and by 
whose advice they are guided to a greater or less degree in 
forming courses of study and in the appointment of 
teachers, we find the ground plan for a complete differ- 
entiation of structures, and a complete specialization of 
functions. 

THE STATE AND CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

Let us consider first the relation of the state to city 
school systems. The maintenance of public schools is a 
duty that belongs to the several states. So much is to be 
inferred from the language of the fundamental law. As 
the care of education is not delegated by the National 
Constitution to the United States, nor prohibited by it 
to the states, it follows that this duty devolves upon the 
several states. What, then, is this duty ? Evidently to 
take such measures as may be necessary to secure to every 
citizen such an education as will enable him to be self- 
supporting, and able intelligently to perform the duties of 
citizenship. " Why,'" ask the advocates of laissez faire, 
" should not education be left to the individual ? Why 
should not education be placed in the same category as 
manufacturing, buying, and selling, and the other opera- 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1890 287 

tions of life which by almost universal consent are now 
left to the judgment of the individual?" Because, to 
summarize the argument as stated by John Stuart Mill : — 

1. The great mass of people are comparatively unculti- 
vated, and the uncultivated cannot be competent judges of 
cultivation. 

2. Those who most need cultivation are least capable of 
hading the way to it by their own lights. 

3. By many people education is not desired ; and where 
the end is not desired, the means will not be provided. 

4. If the end should be, as it probably would, as in 
many communities we know it is, erroneously conceived, 
the means provided would not be suitable. 

These are the reasons why the state is morally bound to 
exercise the legal prerogative of providing public educa- 
tion. But observe, the same arguments which require the 
state to provide for public education, require it, when it 
delegates its powers to a municipality, to take all the 
necessary measures to guard against the abuse of those 
powers. If we are right in holding that public schools 
must be established because the great mass of the people 
cannot yet be trusted spontaneously to provide the requi- 
site means for the education of their children, surely it 
follows that these same people cannot be trusted with the 
absolute control of institutions established, not for local 
purposes merely, but for state purposes. The low aver- 
age of development in the units of which society is com- 
posed, is alike the argument for the existence of public 
schools, and for the establishment of state supervision 
over such schools. 

In the light of the law of evolution, that progress comes 



288 CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

through differentiation of structure and specialization of 
function, I shall now endeavor to determine the special 
functions which in an ideal system would be undertaken by 
the state on the one hand, and by local officers on the 
other hand. 

A MINIMUM STATE COURSE OF STUDY 

First of all, within certain limits the state should deter- 
mine the course of study to be pursued in all its public 
schools. It should determine the minimum amount of 
knowledge necessary for citizenship. It should fix the 
subjects of study and their proper sequence, and it should 
fix the minimum amount of time per week to be devoted to 
each subject. It should do this, first, because the state, 
through its properly constituted authorities, can command, 
as a municipality cannot or will not, the services of the 
most scientific thinkers and most expert educators, to 
formulate a course of study. 

Again, the experience of all other countries that have 
enacted compulsory education laws is, that in order to make 
the law effective it is necessary to establish a minimum of 
knowledge before acquiring which a child shall not be per- 
mitted to go to work. But where there is not a uniform 
course of study, a common standard cannot be established. 
The consequence is that our compulsory education laws are 
to a very great extent inoperative. Even when the power 
is conferred upon school officers to require all children to 
attend school a certain number of weeks each year, it is 
often obeyed in the letter and violated in the spirit. There 
is no uniform standard which all must attain ; and conse- 
quently children by the thousands, who have attended the 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1890 289 

prescribed time, are every year put to work before they 
acquire the minimum of knowledge which every citizen 
should possess. 

Then, again, the establishment of a uniform and con- 
sistent course of study in all institutions of learning from 
the primary school to the university, will prevent that 
waste of time and energy which moving from one locality 
co another or from a lower school to a higher, now involves. 
Let the most ardent of "home rulers" consider the anoma- 
lies of our present system. A boy twelve years of age 
moves from New York to Brooklyn. He has completed 
fractions in arithmetic iathe school he has just left. When 
ne enters a Brooklyn school he must thresh over all the 
old arithmetic straw because, forsooth, he doesn't know the 
subject from the predicate of a sentence, or the difference 
between a preposition and an interjection. Or if he leaves 
a Brooklyn school and enters one of certain New York 
schools, he will find himself put back in a similar manner 
because he cannot handle a chisel without cutting his fin- 
gers, or cannot recite the names of all the bones in the 
human body. And who shall say what and how great 
losses may be entailed upon a child by the practical ex- 
cision of even one short year from his school life ? Or, 
again, to take the higher phases of educational work, how 
absurd it is that, as often happens, a boy should pass 
through a primary school, a grammar school, and a high 
school, and yet find himself denied admission to a uni- 
versity because he had not studied Greek, or had not per- 
formed a certain number of experiments in physics ! The 
president of Princeton told us last summer in Brooklyn 
that one great need of the educational systems of this 



290 CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

country was proper articulation ; and I most heartily agree 
with him. 

Our amorphous, disjointed system reminds me forcibly 
of a line of railroad upon which I had once occasion fre- 
quently to travel : one half of it was operated by one com- 
pany, the other half by another. The two companies were 
at swords' points. If one train could possibly get away 
from the junction before the other arrived, it invariably 
did so, and the belated and disappointed passengers were 
left to spend the night as best they could. And so it 
is, at least in New York State, with educational af- 
fairs. The educational trains do not wait for one another. 
The students, nay, the whole people, are the sufferers. 
The remedy is for the state to step in and take control. 
Then there will be no question as to whether the univer- 
sity shall articulate down, or the public school shall articu- 
late up. 

To recapitulate, the three reasons for state control of 
the course of study are : — 

1. That the uniform course of study would be a better 
course of study than the average of the many diverse 
courses of study now in existence. 

2. That a uniform standard for compulsory-education 
purposes would be possible. 

3. That all parts of the system would be consistent, and 
the loss of time and waste of energy, now everywhere 
apparent, would be obviated. 

While the elementary part of such a state course of 
study should be obligatory in all school districts, the wis- 
dom of leaving the higher parts to the option of the local 
authorities will be at once apparent. 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1890 291 
QUALIFICATIONS OF TEACHERS 

Another subject proper to state control is the regula- 
tion of the qualifications of teachers. This state, for ex- 
ample-, has established and supports ten state normal 
schools ; and there are besides several city training schools 
and teachers' classes in academies and union schools. 
Yet not 25 per cent of all the teachers in the public schools 
of the state have gone through a regular course of pro- 
fessional training. The state has provided the means to 
prepare teachers for their work; it has not required that 
those who enter the public educational service shall have 
any special qualifications in the way of training. The re- 
sult is that normal schools, in this state at least, are rather 
academies than training schools ; and that every year there 
is poured into our schools a mass of untrained teaching 
material that acts like a brake upon the wheels of educa- 
tional, progress. It may be objected : Do not you city 
superintendents subject all candidates for teachers' posi- 
tions to severe examinations in scholarship, and is not this 
a sufficient test of qualification ? True, I answer, we have 
our examinations ; but these examinations, except to the 
ignorant, are not severe. The scholastic attainments of 
the great majority of the applicants for teachers' licenses 
— the licenses of the lowest grade, I mean — in all the 
cities with which I am acquainted, would not entitle their 
owners to matriculate in Yale or Harvard. "Why, then," 
it may be asked, "are not your examinations more severe ? " 
Simply because it is absolutely necessary, in order to pro- 
vide a sufficient number of class teachers, to issue a certain 
number of licenses each year; and, on the one hand, there 



2Q2 CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

is no central authority to lay down a proper standard of 
qualifications, nor, on the other hand, is the position of 
class teacher made either so remunerative or so agreeable 
as to attract to the service large numbers of persons of a 
high grade of scholarship. And yet this is the most im- 
portant consideration of all. As the teacher is, the class 
is. As the teachers are, the school is. While year after 
year thousands of persons, not of a high grade of scholar- 
ship, and with no knowledge of the scientific principles, 
methods, and history of education, are appointed as teachers 
in the public schools, can we expect to raise our schools to 
that plane which they ought to occupy, to make them that 
civilizing force which the necessities of our political sys- 
tem demand ? The state will not allow a lawyer to prac- 
tice on our property, nor a physician upon our bodies, nor 
even a dentist upon our teeth, unless he has successfully 
gone through a course of professional training. Should it 
exercise less care in the case of those who are to practice 
on the intellectual and moral faculties of its own citizens ? 
Surely not. Surely if this subject were understood, if its 
tremendous importance were appreciated, all intelligent, 
conscientious men and women would stand shoulder to 
shoulder for this the greatest of all educational reforms. 

THE LICENSING OF TEACHERS 

Closely connected with this subject is the licensing of 
teachers. If the state is to prescribe the qualifications of 
teachers, it follows that licenses should be issued directly by 
the educational executive officer of the state, or indirectly by 
his representatives, who should be responsible to him, and 
to him alone, for the discharge of this great trust. Under 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1890 293 

no circumstances should licenses be issued or examinations 
for licenses be conducted by persons who are not profes- 
sional teachers. No local board of education should have 
power to control this branch of our work. It is wholly 
professional, and, in my judgment, belongs to the state 
superintendent of public instruction, or a duly authorized 
representative. 

Another matter which the state should control is the 
compilation of educational statistics. Statistics may be 
used as a basis for the distribution of the state school fund, 
or for purposes of comparison, or as the basis of legislative 
action. In all three cases they are worth very little, un- 
less collected in a uniform manner. 

THE STATE EDUCATIONAL AUTHORITIES 

The four lines of work in which, as I have indicated, all 
the cities of the state should be subject to a central educa- 
tional power, are the laying out of a course of study, the 
determination of the qualifications of teachers, the licensing 
of teachers, and the compiling of educational statistics. 
What machinery will be necessary for the performance of 
these high and onerous duties ? Here again we find the 
germ of what we want in existing systems. In nearly every 
state there is a state superintendent, and in most states a 
state board of education. The powers of the state superin- 
tendent should be greatly enlarged. The state board of 
education might be merely an advisory body, or it might be 
a legislative body, or it might be partly advisory and partly 
legislative ; but in all cases it should consist exclusively, 
as it does in France, of professional educators. In it should 
be represented the faculties of all the leading colleges and 



294 CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

universities, the faculties of all the leading professional 
schools, and the school officers of cities and counties, in 
proportion to population. Would not such a board of edu- 
cation give us a course of study that would lead directly, 
to use Huxley's phrase, from the gutter to the university ? 
Would it not determine the professional training of teachers 
in such a way as to make teaching really a profession ? 
Would it not devise plans for the licensing of teachers such 
as those adopted in Germany, that would effectually shut 
out the ignorant and incompetent ? With such a board of 
education at his back, what could not a clear-headed, ener- 
getic state superintendent accomplish ? 

LOCAL EDUCATIONAL AUTHORITIES 

What would be left for the local authorities of cities ? 
Much, and of the highest importance. The course of study 
would be formed ; the qualifications of teachers would be 
determined ; but there would remain the execution of this 
course of study, the selection of textbooks, the employment 
and payment of teachers, the discipline of the schools, the 
location and building of schoolhouses, and the thousand 
other matters of minor importance that belong to the man- 
agement of city schools. In trying to determine how these 
functions shall be best performed, let us bear constantly in 
mind the two facts : First, that all progress depends upon 
differentiation of structure and specialization of function ; 
and, second, that we are likely to find in existing systems 
the promise and potency of all forms of educational reform. 
Indeed, the machinery is everywhere ready to our hand. 
In some places it is better oiled, and works more expedi- 
tiously and more surely than in others, but in nearly all 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1890 295 

places it is practically the same. In some places — and I 
am happy to say that my own city of Brooklyn is one of 
them — differentiation of structure and specialization of 
function have been carried much farther than in others ; 
but in all we find great similarity in the ground plan of the 
system. Everywhere we find a board of education. It 
may be only a committee of the city council, as in Buffalo, 
but still it is a board of education. We find superintend- 
ents, with or without assistants, according to the sizes of 
cities. We find principals, with or without assistant over- 
seers, according to the sizes of their schools. And lastly, 
we find class teachers. How shall the various functions 
be distributed among these officers ? Upon what principle 
shall the division of functions be made ? That principle, 
as I have already pointed out, is responsibility. For cer- 
tain lines of work, boards of education should be respon- 
sible ; for certain lines of work, professional educators 
should be responsible. 

BOARDS OF EDUCATION 

The board of education, be it large or small, be its mem- 
bers elected by popular vote or appointed by the mayor, 
with or without the approval of the city council, is still 
directly or indirectly the representative of the people of 
the vicinage in the management of the schools, and as such 
it has the disbursement of the school moneys, which come 
in large measure from local taxes. The board should 
select the sites for school buildings, and, either directly or 
through its agents, superintend the construction. It should 
purchase all supplies, either directly or through an agent. 
In these matters the attitude of scholastic officers should 



296 CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

be purely advisory, except in the case of textbooks. Text 
books being so intimate a part of the scholastic work, and 
so nearly allied to the course of study, the selection should 
rest absolutely with the scholastic officers. But after the 
selection has been made, all business transactions should 
be conducted by the board. The board, too, must employ 
all teachers. But then the question arises : What teach- 
ers ? Who shall make the selection ? Were the requisite 
machinery for determining the qualifications of teachers by 
the state authorities once set in motion, this would be a 
matter of much less consequence than it is at present ; but 
as matters stand now it is one of the highest importance. 
Who shall make the nominations ? Shall it be a ward or 
district board of trustees, or a local committee composed 
of one, two, or three members of the central board; shall 
it be a larger standing committee of the board, or shall the 
whole board both nominate and appoint, or shall the super- 
intendent nominate, or shall the principal of each school 
nominate ? 

These, I believe, exhaust all the possible methods. The 
first four methods — nominations by district boards of 
trustees, or by the central board or its committees — though 
the most common, are clearly violations of the law of 
evolution. They are objectionable, first, because the men 
who compose such committees have not, in the majority of 
cases, the special knowledge necessary to decide upon the 
merits of candidates ; and, second, because such bodies are 
apt to be susceptible to the various forms of political and 
social influence which it is the duty of every conscientious 
school officer to disregard, and if necessary to fight at all 
hazards. 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1890 297 
THE APPOINTMENT OF TEACHERS 

Should nominations, then, be made by the superintend- 
ent ? I answer emphatically, no. In the first place, no 
one man can have the necessary knowledge of all the 
members of the vast army of teachers employed in the 
public schools of one of our large cities, to regulate ap- 
pointments and promotions according to the merits of the 
appointees, and for the best interests of the service. In 
the second place, the city superintendent grants, or ought 
to grant, licenses to teach, and the officer who performs 
this duty should be freed from all entangling alliances. 
As said our honorable President in his last annual report : 
" It would seem opposed to wise policy to confer upon the 
same persons the power both to certify teachers and to 
employ them. The opportunities for favoritism are so 
great that only the strongest men will refrain from help- 
ing their personal friends, or the favorites of their friends, 
to positions in the schools, with little regard to their fitness 
for the trust." Is, then, the principal of a school the 
proper person to intrust with this power ? In my judgment, 
yes. He has, or should have, a more intimate knowledge 
of the requirements of his school than any other person. 
He should be responsible for his school, from the lowest 
class to the highest. How can he be held responsible 
when he has no voice in the selection of his subordinates ; 
when, contrary to his protest, incompetent teachers may 
be retained in his classes ? Responsibility is the quantity 
that determines the lines along which differentiation should 
proceed. All financial and business affairs are given over 
to the board of education, because the board is directly 



298 CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

responsible to the people, or to the people's representatives, 
for the expenditure of the people's money ; and, in like 
manner, the principal, being responsible to the state, or to 
the state's representatives, for the education given in his 
school, should have large powers in the matter of the 
selection of teachers. The superintendent should share 
these powers only so far as to have a veto in the case of an 
appointment of an incompetent teacher, and to have the 
power of nominating, when it is advisable to transfer a 
teacher from one school to another; and the board of edu- 
cation should share them only as far as confirmation is 
concerned. Confirmation by the board of education, which 
of course implies the power of rejection, would be a neces- 
sary check upon the principal's power, and would cause 
him to feel a keen sense of his high responsibility. 

THE REMOVAL OF TEACHERS 

Closely connected with the subject of appointment is 
the question of removal of teachers. If admission to the 
teacher's profession were regulated on proper principles 
by the state, it would follow that the power of arbitrary 
removal would no longer remain with the local authorities 
— either school officers, or a board of education. Here I 
think we would do well to borrow from the Prussian school 
system. "Although," says President Adams of Cornell 
in describing the Prussian school law, " although the proper 
authorities of a district may select, from those having the 
requisite acquirements, a teacher for their school, when he 
has once been installed they cannot remove him. Such 
removal can be brought about only by the provincial 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1890 299 

board. The object of this provision is easily seen. The 
government says : The teacher has made a long study of 
pedagogy, and he has greater ability to judge of the art of 
teaching and managing scholars than those can have who 
have had no such training. We will no more allow the 
people of a district on their whim to turn out a teacher 
whom we have educated, than we will allow a military 
company to turn out a captain. If it can be made to ap- 
pear that there are good reasons why he should be turned 
out, those reasons must be presented to the provincial 
board, since they are so far removed as to be free from 
prejudice." How different from this ideal system is that 
which obtains in the state of New York ! In his annual 
report, Superintendent Draper shows that out of 10,644 
rural districts reporting, " More than half of them had a 
teacher who had not taught in the same district a pre- 
ceding term. More than 75 per cent had not been a 
year in their present situations." Doubtless, if statistics 
were collected for the cities of the state, they would make 
a better showing than the rural districts ; but it may be 
set down as a settled principle — the outgrowth of abundant 
experience in this and all other countries — that perma- 
nency of tenure on the part of teachers is one of the primary 
conditions of having good schools. It is not, however, per- 
manency of tenure for inefficient teachers that we want, 
but permanency of tenure for those whose qualifications 
have been tried by competent authority ; and, as I have 
already pointed out, that authority should be vested in a 
body of professional teachers clothed with powers derived, 
not from a county or a municipality, but directly from the 
state itself. 



300 CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

QUALIFICATIONS AND APPOINTMENT OF EDUCATIONAL 

OFFICERS 

There are certain corollaries which, I think, flow logically 
from the premises I have laid down. If the state, through 
its educational officers, is to make the course of study for 
all public schools within its borders ; if the state, through 
its educational officers, is to determine the qualifications of 
teachers and to license all teachers ; if teachers should be 
appointed by the boar is of education, upon the nomination 
of principals, subject to confirmation by the board of edu- 
cation — if these things are granted, the following corol- 
laries must be accepted : — 

1. The office of state superintendent must cease to be a 
political office. 

2. The city superintendent should, in all the educational 
matters of the municipality, directly represent the state. 

3. As the representative of the state, his qualifications 
should be determined and his license should be issued by 
the central educational authority. 

4. He should be appointed by the municipal educational 
authorities only upon the nomination of the state educa- 
tional authorities. 

5. He should be appointed either for a long term of 
years, as are the judges of the supreme court, or should 
be appointed for life, and should be removable only by the 
state board of education, on complaint of a municipal or 
county board. 

6. Principals of schools who are to be responsible on 
the one hand to the municipal board for getting the best 
possible results from the expenditure of the people's money, 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1890 301 

and to the local superintendent for the execution of the 
state course of study, and to both for the nomination of 
subordinate teachers, should be appointed by the munici- 
pal board on the nomination of the superintendent, either 
for life or a long term of years ; and should be removable 
by the state board upon complaint either of the munici- 
pal board or of the superintendent. 

There are other questions which might, perhaps, be re- 
garded as coming within the scope of this paper. Such 
questions are : Whether public schools should have many 
or few classes ; whether promotions of pupils should be 
made once a year or twice a year ; whether promotions 
should be made upon the results of examination, or of 
teachers' estimates ; whether each school should receive 
pupils only from a limited district, or from any part of 
a municipality ; what should be the particular duties of 
superintendents and principals in the matter of training 
teachers and in the general government of the schools ? 
But these questions I have not the time to consider ; and 
if I had the time, I have not the inclination. They are 
questions that have been discussed time and again before 
this department, by men abler and more experienced than 
I — men from whom I would gladly learn — men whom it 
would be presumption in me to attempt to instruct. They 
are questions, moreover, whose solution will probably never 
come in any final form until uniform organization shall 
have been attained. 

Uniform organization can come only through the re- 
sumption on the part of the state of that control over 
educational administration in cities as well as in country 
districts, which will provide a uniform course of study, 



302 CITY SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

which will prevent the employment of incompetent teachers, 
and which to the efficient will secure permanency of em- 
ployment and freedom from all forms of persecution. As 
differentiation of structure and specialization of function 
in political societies lead directly to the greatest legitimate 
liberty on the part of the citizen, so will differentiation of 
structure and specialization of function lead to the greatest 
legitimate liberty for the teacher in his own peculiar prov- 
ince ; liberty to pursue his calling, to perform his professional 
work, with an eye single to the interests of his pupils. 

THE REALIZATION OF AN IDEAL 

"The State," says Sir William Hamilton, "may wisely 
establish, protect, and regulate ; but unless it continue a 
watchful inspection, the protected establishment will soon 
degenerate into a public nuisance — a monopoly for merely 
private advantage." What I would plead for is that in- 
spection and supervision by the state which will effectu- 
ally prevent our great public school system being used for 
merely private advantage, whether political or religious. 
That it may be used, that in some places it is used, " for 
merely private advantage," there is only too good reason 
to believe. And whenever this has come to pass, the effi- 
ciency of our schools is impaired in two ways : first, by 
diminishing the power of the teacher for good ; second, by 
preventing many men and women of independent character 
from entering the profession, because they will not stoop 
to practice the fawning that leads to thrift. The position 
the teacher — even the humblest — ought to occupy may 
not unfitly be symbolized in the beautiful lines ; — • 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1890 303 

As some tall cliff that lifts its awful form, 
Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm, 
Tho' round its breast the rolling clouds are spread, 
Eternal sunshine settles on its head. 

The storms of political strife may seethe around him, the 
clouds of social crime may envelop him, but he should be 
a soul that, ever mingling with and ever fighting the ob- 
scene tumult, is never by it contaminated. The state has 
no higher duty than to create the conditions under which 
this ideal may be realized. Can this ideal ever be realized ? 
Perhaps not, in our time. But it is a duty we owe to society, 
it is a duty we owe to ourselves, to grasp the ideal firmly, 
and to bend all our energies to its attainment. The his- 
tory of evolution shows that all true reforms come slowly. 
Oftentimes it happens that what seems wholly evil lays the 
foundation for what is good. War and pestilence, cruelty 
and oppression, have all had their parts to play in the econ- 
omy that has evolved civilization out of barbarism. The 
trials to which public education has been subjected are 
doubtless the means by which the system will be molded to 
better and nobler things. Oftentimes we may seem to ret- 
rograde when we are only gathering strength for another 
great advance. The wheels of progress can no more stop 
than the earth can stand still. 

" Swing on, old pendulum of the earth, 
Forever and forever, 
Keeping the time of suns and stars — 

The march that endeth never ! 
Long as you swing, shall earth be glad, 
And men be partly good and bad ; 
Long as you swing, shall wrong come right, 
As sure as morning follows night ; 
The days go wrong ; the ages never. 
$wing on, old pendulum, swing forever J " 



XXIX 

CHARTER PROVISIONS AS RELATED TO 
THE ORGANIZATION OF SCHOOL SYSTEMS 

(A paper read before the Department of Superintendence of the National 
Educational Association, at Milwatikee, Wis., February, igoj) 

IN any consideration of the regulations that ought to be 
inserted in a city charter with regard to the public 
school system to be conducted for the people resident within 
the city's borders, the fundamental principle to be borne in 
mind is that the state, and not the city, is primarily re- 
sponsible for public education. In all the duties imposed on 
the city regarding education, whether they pertain to the 
physical side, as in the building and maintenance of school 
houses, or to the intellectual and moral side, as in teaching 
and supervision, the city acts only as the agent of the state. 
The members of the board of education, whether they are 
elected by the people or appointed by the mayor, and the 
executive officers of the board, such as the superintendent 
of schools and the superintendent of buildings, are primarily 
state officers and only secondarily city officers. 

Like all other social and political distinctions, this prin- 
ciple has its roots in a remote antiquity. Among the laws 
attributed to Solon in Athens is one enjoining on parents 
to have their children instructed in music and gymnastics, 
and providing also that no son was bound to support his 

304 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 



o u o 



father in old age if the father had neglected to have 
the son instructed in a trade at which he could earn his 
living. In Sparta the state charged itself with the entire 
education of all male children after six years of age. Plato, 
and more particularly Aristotle, made education one of the 
chief functions of government. Every European country 
has now its ministry of public instruction, charged with the 
duty of providing and enforcing popular education. A 
long series of decisions in the courts in several of our states 
has enunciated and confirmed the principle. The most 
recent, and perhaps the strongest, of these decisions was 
rendered only a year ago by the Court of Appeals of New 
York. In expressing the unanimous judgment of the court, 
Judge O'Brien wrote as follows : — 

We have seen that the policy of this state for more than half a century has 
been to separate public education from all other municipal functions, and 
intrust it to independent corporate agencies of its own creation, such as school 
districts and boards of education, with capacity to sue and be sued in all 
matters involved in the exercise of their corporate powers. 

This view of the law is in accord with the fitness of 
things. No agency less extensive and less powerful than 
the state has the necessary authority and the necessary 
resources to provide and to enforce universal education. 
All history shows that, when education is not provided 
and enforced under the authority of the law, it is poorly 
provided and never enforced. 

It would scarcely be worth while to occupy your time 
and attention with this principle, were it not that there is 
constant necessity to restate the fundamental truths on 
which our institutions are constructed. In the storm and 
stress of modern life, in the emulation among individuals 



306 CHARTER PROVISIONS 

and communities, the respective rights and duties of the 
state and of local authorities are either forgotten or mingled 
in inextricable confusion. Such is the condition of thought 
to-day in many places with regard to the attitude of the 
state, on the one side, and of local authorities, on the other 
side, toward public education. The time was in the older 
states when the local community was entirely willing that 
the state should do as it pleased regarding education, as 
long as the local taxpayer was not called upon to pay the 
bills. A striking example of this disposition was the at- 
titude of the Free School Society of New York City, which 
came into being just a century ago. That society proposed 
to found schools for poor children that were not under 
instruction in the schools of any religious sect, and to sup- 
port them by voluntary contributions with such aid as 
might from time to time be obtained by grants from the 
state. In his address delivered at the opening of the so- 
ciety's first school building in 1809, De Witt Clinton, great 
statesman though he was, argued against local taxation for 
the support of public schools on the ground that such tax- 
ation would set the people against education. Having 
instanced the tax for free schools in Pennsylvania, he went 
on to say : " The people of Pennsylvania are therefore 
interested against a faithful execution of the plan, because 
the less that is applied to education, the less they will have 
to pay in taxation." How false this view is, the history 
of public schools testifies. As the school tax has increased, 
instead of becoming interested against public schools, the 
people have become interested in and for public schools. 
And this sentiment is altogether natural. People are 
always interested in what they are paying for, and particu- 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 307 

larly when the object of their disbursements is so near to 
them as the education of their own children. Such an 
opinion as that expressed by De Witt Clinton is possible 
only where free schools are regarded as charity schools — 
schools for those who cannot afford to pay for the tuition 
of their children. With the advent of a broader view of 
the objects and possibilities of public education, such 
opinions tend to disappear. When men begin to under- 
stand — and the generality of men do not yet fully under- 
stand — that public schools are the people's schools, that 
they are for all, rich and poor alike ; when they realize 
that one of the prime objects of public education is to 
provide, as far as public education can provide, equal op- 
portunities for all ; and when they bring home to themselves 
the profound truth that democratic institutions will remain 
democratic only on condition that the people remain en- 
lightened, — then will they take a keen interest in their own 
schools. But in every community there are those who 
realize these things only in part ; in every community there 
are forces that would use the schools for wrong or selfish 
purposes. 

These persons may perhaps be divided into two classes : 
first, those whose opinions have not advanced beyond the 
views of De Witt Clinton and his friends who founded the 
Free School Society of New York, and who argue that, as 
free public schools should be only for the children of the 
poor, their work should be confined to the rudiments of an 
English education — the three R's, so to speak; second, 
those who believe, though they proclaim their faith by their 
acts rather than by their words, that the position of teacher, 
principal, or superintendent, is one of the spoils of office, and 



308 CHARTER PROVISIONS 

should go to whoever has the requisite political influence 
to obtain it. The complete triumph of either class would 
set education in any community back at least a generation. 

When the community is unable or unwilling to protect 
itself and its public schools against these evil influences, it 
has a right to the protection of the state, exercised through 
the state's proper officers. In view of the duties to be 
performed and the dangers to be avoided, the functions of 
the state regarding education may be regarded as three- 
fold : — 

First, either to provide education for all, or to require 
that suitable education be provided by each community. 

Second, to provide, or to require the community to pro- 
vide, the means of enforcing education upon all children ; 
because the man who fails to give his children education 
commits a twofold crime — a crime against his children, 
whom he deprives of much of the happiness and success 
of life, and a crime against society, whose strength and 
prosperity are diminished by the ignorance of any of its 
members. 

Third, to provide such laws and such machinery as will 
protect the schools against the attacks either of foolish 
doctrinaires or of unscrupulous politicians. 

There is one great danger, however, in the exercise of 
the state's educational functions ; namely, that, if too 
much dependence be placed upon the state, local spon- 
taneity and local effort may be discouraged. The best 
means hitherto found to enable the state to reenforce, with- 
out discouraging local authorities, is the enactment, by its 
legislative branch, of laws laying down minimum require- 
ments, and the making of regulations by its educational 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 309 

officers which have the force of law. These laws may 
either be general enactments, or they may be embodied in 
city charters. They should embrace at least the following 
provisions : — 

1. The limits of age within which all children must go to school. 

2. The minimum extent of school buildings which each community must 
provide in order to accommodate its school population. 

3. The minimum amount of time to be spent in academic studies and pro- 
fessional training by candidates for teachers' licenses. 

4. The establishment of institutions in which such training may be given. 

5. A method of appointing teachers that shall eliminate political, social, 
and every other consideration, except that of merit. 

6. A sure and certain means of raising revenue that shall increase as popu- 
lation increases. 

7. A minimum salary for teachers that shall be in some degree commen- 
surate with their training and with the social position they ought to occupy. 

8. Pensions for old age after physical and mental disqualification. 

It should be made by law the duty of the state's educa- 
tional executive officer — call him state superintendent, 
commissioner of education, or what you will — to see that 
such laws are enforced by local authorities, and to deter- 
mine, always with the aid of a council of educators, mini- 
mum courses of study for all grades of public schools — 
elementary schools, high schools, and training schools. It 
follows that he should be clothed with ample authority to 
carry the laws into effect and to enforce his own ordi- 
nances. 

The community or the municipality should always have 
the authority to go as far beyond the minimum require- 
ments of the state as the people, or their representatives in 
a board of education, may determine. In this way the 
schools have the protection of the state, while local enter- 
prise is encouraged. In proof of this statement I cite the 



310 CHARTER PROVISIONS 

experience of New York. In 1895 that state enacted a 
law laying down the minimum amount of time to be spent 
in academic and professional training by candidates for 
teachers' licenses in cities, and authorizing the state 
superintendent to lay down minimum courses of study for 
the institutions in which such training is given. There is 
not a city in the state that has not made requirements 
exceeding the minimum requirements both in duration and 
in extent. 

It has fallen to my lot in this discussion to set forth the 
reasons why the state should prescribe minimum require- 
ments with regard to the training and appointment of 
teachers in cities. For the present I shall confine myself 
to the training and appointment of teachers in elementary 
schools. I shall assume in this presence that there is no 
difference of opinion as to what should be the minimum 
amount of time a teacher in elementary schools should 
devote to training. The academic training should be not 
less than four years of high school or secondary school 
work, which should include English, mathematics (at least 
algebra and plane geometry), a foreign language, history, 
biology, physics, drawing, music, and gymnastics. All of 
these subjects are required to develop and strengthen the 
powers of the mind, and to provide the foundation upon 
which professional training may afterward be built. The 
minimum amount of time to be devoted to professional 
training should be two years. 

The specific question, however, arises : Should a city of 
considerable size — one, say, that requires a hundred or 
more new teachers each year — be required by law to 
maintain a training or normal school for teachers ? This 



NATIONAL EDUCATIOxMAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 311 

question should be answered in the affirmative for the 
following reasons : — 

1. While it is highly desirable that a considerable propor- 
tion — say, one fourth, or one third — of the new teachers 
appointed in a city school system each year should come 
from outside the system, yet experience has shown that in 
all our large cities the majority of the teachers are and 
must be drawn from the system itself. Local sentiment 
enforces this policy ; necessity compels it. In any one of 
our rapidly growing cities it is simply impossible to obtain 
a sufficient number of teachers from outside to fill vacan- 
cies, and to teach the new classes which it is necessary to 
form each year in order to meet the increase in population. 
It follows, therefore, that each large city must train the 
greater part of its own teachers. 

2. The pressure from politicians, on the one hand, to 
have the sons and daughters of their friends, or of those 
whom they desire to favor, appointed teachers, is a con- 
stant force with which we must reckon. The pressure of 
parents, on the other hand, to secure teacherships for their 
children, particularly the daughters, at the earliest possible 
age, is also a constant and even stronger force. These 
two forces acting together are ever tending to lower, or 
even to break down, the barriers which local educational 
authorities set up to exclude untrained teachers from the 
schools. So powerful are these forces that a city training 
school is in constant danger of being emasculated, if not 
overthrown, by their corrosive strength. It should, there- 
fore, as a necessary condition of good schools, be estab- 
lished and protected by law. 

3. In a large city a training school for teachers is neces- 



312 CHARTER PROVISIONS 

sary to maintain educational standards. In a city school 
system, owing to the rapid multiplication of schools and 
teachers, there is a constant tendency to sag, to lower the 
standard of results. If any one doubts this statement, he 
has only to reflect for a moment on what must be the effect 
of bringing a large number of inexperienced teachers — in 
New York it is over one thousand — each year into the 
schools. Of the measures that may be adopted to neutral- 
ize the demoralizing effects of too rapid growth, a training 
school for teachers — particularly if it embrace, as it should, 
a model school — is probably the most effective. Here 
will be a school which is always manned by teachers of ex- 
perience and of the largest ability; a school which is never 
weakened by an influx of inexperienced teachers. Such a 
school is a model, a standard, a tonic for all the other schools 
of the system. Its establishment and maintenance under 
the authority of law is, therefore, demanded as one of the 
protective measures which the state is called upon to enact 
for the preservation and uplifting of its public schools. 

4. City training schools are necessary, because, if I may 
judge from my own experience, there are very few institu- 
tions other than city training schools, which provide the spe- 
cific training that teachers in large cities require. Under the 
conditions of life in our large cities, the schools must supply, 
as far as schools may, the training which in the country is 
obtained by work in the home or on the farm. The country 
boy who does chores about the house or on the farm before 
and after school, who cuts firewood, or brings in water, or 
tends the cattle, or helps to train a colt, or who plants seeds 
and protects the seedlings from birds and weeds, is acquir- 
ing a knowledge, and receiving a training in the use of his 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 313 

hands and eyes, in judgment, in carefulness, and in execu- 
tive power, which is denied to the city boy. If the crowded 
populations of our great cities are not to degenerate physi- 
cally and mentally, the city teachers must be trained to 
supply in some measure the deficiency. It is not enough 
that a city teacher should be able to teach language and 
grammar and penmanship and arithmetic and geography 
and history and drawing. She must be a trained observer, 
in order to detect and to treat properly the idiosyncrasies 
of children brought up under peculiar and always artificial 
conditions ; she must be an athlete, to teach gymnastics 
and lead in children's games ; she must be a mechanic, to 
give boys the use of their hands through exercises in wood 
and metal ; and she must be expert with scissors and 
needle, to teach girls to sew and to make their own dresses. 
It is chiefly in the large cities that all these qualifications 
are demanded. As far as my experience goes, the city 
training school is almost the only institution that is turning 
out teachers adapted to the city's needs. The lectures of 
the university professor of pedagogy on the principles and 
history of education are admirable in their stimulating, 
knowledge-giving, and view-enlarging effects for teachers 
of experience ; but they constitute a poor preparation for 
the young teacher, full though his head may be with theory, 
when he suddenly finds himself confronted with fifty unruly 
urchins, who perceive their teacher's defects and limitations 
much more quickly than he does himself. The state nor- 
mal schools, with some exceptions, have not adapted them- 
selves to city conditions. For the most part they are still 
secondary schools, with a little professional training thrown 
in. They have not yet risen to the height of the great 



314 CHARTER PROVISIONS 

argument that teaching is a profession, and requires a pe- 
culiar institution in which its intending professors shall 
devote their whole time and thought and energy to learning 
the science and acquiring the art of teaching. For the 
present at least, therefore, we must depend upon city train- 
ing schools to develop the peculiar type of teacher which 
the conditions of life in our large cities demand. 

For purposes both of minimum requirement and of pro- 
tection, city training schools should be established under 
the authority of law. 

We may now pass to the second part of the subject — 
the licensing and appointing of teachers. The theses which 
I lay down may be stated as follows : — 

1. All licenses should be probationary, and should be made permanent 
only after the ability to teach well has been demonstrated and the habit of 
skillful teaching has been acquired. 

2. Teachers should be nominated and appointed and promoted by an 
expert, or a body of experts, as nearly as possible in the order of standing from 
eligible lists prepared as the result of examination by an independent board 
of expert examiners. 

The first thesis — that teachers' licenses should be tem- 
porary and revocable until success has been demonstrated — 
is so obviously in the interest of the schools and the people, 
and, indeed, is now so generally adopted, that I shall not 
consume time in stating the arguments in its support. 

Nor is it necessary to discuss at length the proposition 
that teachers should be appointed and promoted, not by 
laymen, but by experts in teaching and school management. 
If the principle of appointment in order of standing from 
an eligible list is accepted, the principle of assignment to 
duty by experts follows as a matter of course. Appoint- 
ment, then, means assignment to position; and surely, if 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 315 

any part of the procedure requires expert knowledge, the 
placing of each teacher at that kind of work which she can 
do best, is that part. 

The real crux is : Should appointments be made in the 
order of standing from eligible lists prepared as the result 
of competitive examination ? To make appointments of 
teachers in this way is to apply to the teaching profession the 
principle of civil service reform which has now been intro- 
duced with comparative success into other branches of the 
public service, municipal, state, and federal. Such a system 
is undeniably better than the system it supplanted. Said 
George William Curtis, before this department fourteen 
years ago, — 

Whatever foolish questions may be asked, whatever possible frauds prac- 
ticed in an examination, they are wholly insignificant when compared with 
the unspeakable folly and the certain fraud of appointment by patronage, or 
mere personal and partisan favor. 

Having closely watched appointment of teachers by per- 
sonal and partisan favor for nearly twenty years, and 
having participated both in examination and appointment 
under the merit system for nearly six years, I am fully 
prepared to say that the merit system is as far superior to 
the personal system in the appointment of teachers as Mr. 
Curtis found it in other branches of the public service. 
What are the objections that are argued against the merit 
system? It is said that an examination cannot determine 
fitness for classroom duty. Were examination the exclu- 
sive test, there might be some force in the objection ; but 
it is not: probation is a vital condition of the merit system. 
Examinations, however, may be so conducted as to deter- 
mine fitness very closely, certainly to exclude the grossly 



316 CHARTER PROVISIONS 

unfit. Every well-conducted examination consists of two 
parts — a written and an oral. A well-ordered written ex- 
amination is an almost infallible test whether an examinee 
has the ability to marshal his resources at a sudden call, 
whether he can think clearly and coherently, whether he 
has an adequate mastery of written discourse, and whether 
he has the executive ability to adjust the task to the allotted 
time with due sense of proportion. All of these powers 
are powers which the skillful teacher ought to possess, and 
which may be fairly tested by a written examination. As 
the lawyer who cannot think of the proper argument to 
put forward, or the physician of the appropriate drug to 
prescribe, until after the critical moment, is at an enormous 
disadvantage, so the teacher who cannot think of the right 
thing to do or say, or the principal whose pedagogical knowl- 
edge is so profound that he cannot give it expression, is at 
as great a loss in the classroom as in the examination hall. 
The written examination, to serve its purposes, must, of 
course, be a test of whether or not the applicant has the 
knowledge, the power of thought, and the facility in ex- 
pression that a teacher ought to have. An examination 
that would test mere book knowledge or memory would be 
practically useless for the purpose in view. 

There are certain things, however, which a written ex- 
amination cannot determine. It is not a certain test of 
moral character, or of personal charm, cleanliness, address, 
or even of teaching power. It does not reveal bodily de- 
formity, sickness, faulty enunciation, or foreign accent. 
It is even within the limits of possibility that a man may 
write well who talks very badly and hence is unfit for 
teaching work. To determine these matters, other methods 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 317 

of examination must be resorted to. The other methods 
which we use in New York I shall now describe 
briefly : — 

1. An oral examination is given 'only to those whose 
marks in the written examination indicate that they are 
worthy of further consideration. 

2. By the term " oral examination " we mean not merely 
the presentation and answering of oral questions, but also 
an exhaustive investigation of the past history and present 
qualifications of the applicant, both personal and profes- 
sional. The ratio of the maximum record mark to the 
maximum oral mark varies according to the license sought. 
Some licenses require little or no teaching for eligibility, 
as, for instance, the initial license. Other licenses require 
large teaching experience, and this experience must neces- 
sarily be made a matter of investigation. 

Just here let me say that written statements regarding 
teachers must be received and rated with the utmost care. 
They must be rated for what they do not say, no less 
than for what they say. For instance, I have before me, 
as I write, the record of a graduate of a largely attended 
normal school. The principal reports her as " good " in 
scholarship, as ''high" in pedagogical work, as "good" 
in practice-teaching. He further says that his estimate 
of her general teaching ability is "good," and, in 
answer to the question, " Does the applicant speak the 
English* language articulately and correctly?" he re- 
plies, "Yes." At the close of her first year of work in 
New York schools the principal of the school was called 
upon to report upon this teacher's work under several 
headings, as : — 



318 CHARTER PROVISIONS 

Ability to comprehend instructions; skill in blackboard work; skill in ques- 
tioning; thoroughness in developing subjects; use of objective illustration; 
self-control and manners; use of voice; control of class. 

Her statement is: — 

Miss Blank is deficient in all these qualifications. Her imperfect knowledge 
and very deficient enunciation of the English language render her incompe- 
tent to control or interest any class in this department. 

This is only one sample out of hundreds which I might 
adduce to show that school authorities often use unneces- 
sarily roseate language in writing testimonials. Episodes 
of this kind have led the board of examiners to lay great 
stress upon what they term the " oral examination." They 
now lay such stress upon the mark on record, personality, 
and ability to speak the English language, that a bad mark 
in any one of these particulars nullifies the whole exami- 
nation. 

Turning from processes of examination to results, I am 
happy to be able to report that recent investigations have 
shown : — 

First, that those persons who have received the highest 
standings at our examinations have, upon the whole, done 
better than those who received the lowest standings that 
were considered possible. 

Second, nine tenths of those whom it has been necessary 
to dismiss at, or before, the close of the probationary term 
are to be found in the class of persons who received com- 
paratively low standings at the examination. 

Third, the examinations have been the means of bring- 
ing to the New York schools many teachers of high char- 
acter and ability from other places, whose services it would 
not have been possible to obtain in any other way. When 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 319 

it is known that the teachers in a city school system are 
appointed as the result of competitive examination, honestly 
and skillfully conducted, the best teachers from all over 
the country will flock to that city. 

I am very far from claiming that the New York system 
of examination is perfect. I only say that it has served 
the purpose for which it was intended, upon the whole, in 
an admirable way. Indeed, I quite agree with Professor 
Cattell, who recently said : — 

To devise and apply the best methods of determining fitness is the business 
of the psychological expert, who will probably represent at the close of this 
century as important a profession as medicine, law, or church. 

Some of my audience may be inclined to say that much 
better than the New York plan of appointment by com- 
petitive examination is the plan, which has been tried in 
some cities, of committing the entire matter of selecting, 
appointing, and promoting teachers to one man, the super- 
intendent. If, as one of my colleagues in New York 
recently expressed it, a man could be found who is infinite, 
eternal, and unchangeable in his being, wisdom, power, 
holiness, justice, goodness, and truth, we should all be 
entirely willing to place such vast powers in his hands. 
As such men are not to be found, the following objections 
to "one-man power" are, it seems to me, not unreason- 
able : — 

1. No one man has the ability or the knowlege to per- 
form so colossal a task in a large city. He might do it in a 
city of forty or fifty thousand inhabitants, but not in a city 
of half a million. 

2. Where this plan has been tried, it has not infre- 
quently resulted in the overthrow of the superintendent 



320 CHARTER PROVISIONS 

who has honestly tried to perform a task, too great for any- 
individual, under most distressing circumstances. 

3. The effect upon the teaching force is not good. 
It is one of the weaknesses of our poor human nature that 
men and women will cringe before the man who has the 
power to aid or to injure. Teachers tend to lose independ- 
ence of thought and action when they are placed abso- 
lutely in the power of a superintendent; and, just in 
proportion as they lose legitimate independence of thought 
and action, by so much is their good influence as teachers 
diminished. 

I trust I have said enough to show that, in our large 
cities, training schools and the appointment or promotion 
of teachers as the result of competitive examination, should 
be established by law. 



XXX 

PRESENT PROBLEMS OF THE SCHOOL 

{From the Educational Review, November, igo^f) 

BECAUSE parents do not in all cases desire education 
for their children, or, desiring it, do not know what 
good education is, or, knowing what it is, cannot afford to 
procure it for their children, the state is compelled, as a 
measure of self-preservation, and a means of progress, to 
assume the responsibility of establishing and maintaining 
schools. A despotic government may establish schools for 
the purpose of developing a particular type of subject — 
the soldier, for example — as was the case in Sparta. In 
a democratic society, however, the object is, not to develop 
a particular type of citizen, but to develop the fullest 
efficiency, individual and social, of each citizen. In the 
light of this fundamental truth, the following propositions 
regarding the functions of the state and the functions of 
the school in providing education will, I believe, be gen- 
erally accepted. 

FUNCTIONS OF THE SCHOOL 

I. The public schools should provide such an education 
that the opportunities of all citizens to make a living and 
to lead happy and prosperous lives shall be equal, as 
far as education can make them equal. 

321 



322 PRESENT PROBLEMS OF THE SCHOOL 

2. The public schools should provide the highest quality 
of education, not only for the purpose of equalizing the 
opportunities of all, but in order that there may be a 
" perpetual succession of superior minds, by whom knowl- 
edge is advanced, and the community urged forward in 
civilization." 1 Even if comparatively few can avail them- 
selves fully of such education, it is still invaluable to the 
many by supplying intelligent leadership and expert 
counsel. The field of human activity is so enormous that, 
in the more complicated affairs of life, each man outside 
a necessarily limited field of experience, needs and should 
learn to accept the guidance of experts — the specialists 
in the various departments of law, medicine, surgery, 
sanitation, engineering, agriculture, and the like. More- 
over, as Professor Marshall has pointed out, at least one 
half of the best natural genius born into a country belongs 
to the manual labor classes. Without opportunities for 
the higher culture, the greater part of this " best natural 
genius " would be fruitless. Communities that do not pro- 
vide facilities for the training of genius born in obscurity 
are on the highroad to decadence. These are the reasons 
why in all states of the Union, high schools, and in many 
states, colleges and universities, are maintained at the ex- 
pense of the taxpayers. 

3. The school, as distinguished from the college, pro- 
vides training for childhood and youth. The period of 
childhood, from the point of view of the school, extends 
from the third or fourth year to the twelfth ; and the period 
of youth from the thirteenth to the eighteenth. 

1 John Stuart Mill, " Principles of Political Economy," Book V, Chapter 
XI, § 8. 



EDUCATIONAL REVIEW, NOVEMBER, 1904 323 

4. The state should require that the primary ele- 
ments and means of knowledge should be taught to all 
children. 

5. The school should provide training for the body as 
well as for the mind, because the physical nature is the 
foundation of all life, including the mental ; because for 
good or ill the condition of the body influences the mind, 
and the condition of the mind influences the body ; because 
without due coordination between the mind and the body, 
no person is thoroughly equipped for the battle of life ; 
and because a race of men and women capable of enduring 
the labors of peace and the hardships of war is necessary 
to the safety of society. 

6. The intellectual training given in the schools in- 
volves,, in the first place, the adjustment of the mind to 
its spiritual environment through gaining some knowledge 
of the intellectual inheritances of the race, and, in the 
second place, the development of the qualities of industry, 
energy, helpfulness, and devotion to duty — qualities neces- 
sary both to individual and to social progress. 

These six propositions are, I think, fundamental. They 
give rise, however, to a host of most difficult problems in 
practical administration. The limit of this paper permits 
me to discuss briefly only a few of the most important : — 

PHYSICAL EDUCATION 

First among these problems is the problem of physical 
education. 

For the purposes of training the body directly and the 
mind indirectly, four agencies are more or less employed in 
some schools and should be extensively employed in all 



324 PRESENT PROBLEMS OF THE SCHOOL 

schools : play, gymnastics, athletics, and manual training. 
Play has been defined as "the spontaneous physical ex- 
pression of individuality" 1 ; it is "nature's way of prepa- 
ration for later serious living." In the school its use is 
imperative as affording relaxation and reaction from work 
and as preserving the individuality of the pupil by afford- 
ing him an opportunity to follow his own bent. Gym- 
nastics is exercise directed to curing physical defects and 
to making the body strong and graceful. Athletics con- 
sists of organized play involving feats of strength, skill, 
and agility, performed by several persons in competition. 
In addition to the physical qualities developed by gym- 
nastics, athletics develops the intellectual qualities of alert- 
ness, self-knowledge, executive ability, and "presence of 
mind," or the ability to think effectively in a crisis ; and 
the moral qualities of self-control, self-reliance, courage, 
endurance, humility in victory, fortitude in defeat, and 
loyalty to one's fellows through working together for a 
common end. Manual training specifically trains the 
hand as the executive of the mind ; it gives opportunity 
for self-expression in material forms — raffia, paper, paste- 
board, cloth, wood, and metal ; it gives facility in the 
manipulation of ■the simplest and most generally used tools 
that have aided man in his ascent from savagery ; it 
cultivates the mental and moral habits of accuracy and 
truthfulness, and it induces a realization of the dignity of 
labor. 

Without these four forms of physical culture — play, 
gymnastics, athletics, and manual training — no school is 
doing its perfect work. 

1 Home, "The Philosophy of Education," p. 74. 



EDUCATIONAL REVIEW, NOVEMBER, 1904 325 

Only in very recent years has the conception of physical 
education as an essential part of a child's training found 
its way into educational theory and practice. Hence the 
people's schools in our large cities are, as a rule, very in- 
adequately equipped for any of the forms of physical 
education. 

A most serious difficulty in the way of providing such 
equipment is raised by the congestion of population in our 
large cities, caused partly by the ever increasing immigra- 
tion and partly by the continuous movement of population 
from rural to urban life. The result is a deplorable lack 
of space in which children may play. This condition 
exists in nearly all our large cities, and particularly in New 
York, where the huge tenement, crowded to suffocation, 
full of nerve-racking noises, abominable stenches, and woe- 
ful sights, is the home, if home it may be called, of hun- 
dreds of thousands of children. With no place to play but 
the streets, boys, so deep-seated is the instinct for play, 
form organizations of their own for street games. The 
organization is the gang, and the games are gambling, 
stealing, fighting, and sometimes even stabbing or shooting. 
With no comfort or privacy in the rooms they call home, 
girls show a constant tendency to degenerate both phys- 
ically and morally. Moreover, the poorer classes are in 
these days invariably the most prolific. If, as Prime 
Minister Balfour recently pointed out, the chief burden of 
perpetuating the race falls upon the poor in urban com- 
munities, then it is essential to the well-being of society 
that the school should labor incessantly for their physical 
improvement. 

The physical education problem of the school is, there- 



326 PRESENT PROBLEMS OF THE SCHOOL 

fore, twofold : to secure equipment for gymnastics and 
manual training in school buildings and to provide space for 
athletics and free play, in which the child's individuality 
may have scope to develop amid pleasant and healthful 
surroundings. 

AFTER-SCHOOL USE OF PUBLIC SCHOOL BUILDINGS 

A partial solution of the problem is to open the school 
buildings and yards in the afternoon and evening through- 
out the school year and during the summer vacation for 
purposes of manual training, gymnastics, athletics, and 
free play. The New York educational authorities are 
using the school buildings in this way. The result is that 
thousands of children find rest, recreation, and improve- 
ment in the school buildings, that the " little mothers " 
find peace and quiet for their infant charges, and that hun- 
dreds of street gangs are converted into boys' clubs ear- 
nestly seeking self-improvement. 

Even, however, if every schoolho.use in the city were' 
used at all reasonable hours for purposes of recreation and 
improvement, the measure would still fall short of counter- 
acting the tenement house evil. The tenement house 
destroys the home ; and without the well-ordered home 
and its influences, the school can accomplish compara- 
tively little. Nothing short of a revolution in the exist- 
ing tenement house system will restore the life of the 
poor in the city of New York to something like 
normal conditions. And how is this to be accom- 
plished ? I answer unhesitatingly that the tenement 
house, as it has been known in New York City, must 
be eradicated. 



EDUCATIONAL REVIEW, NOVEMBER, 1904 327 

BETTER HOUSING FOR THE POOR 

University and other social settlements are doing good, 
small parks afford some relief, and the public schools are 
doing a good deal and may do much more, but none of 
these instrumentalities goes to the root of the matter. 
The central evil of the crowded tenement is that it destroys 
home and family life, and no cure will be complete except 
a cure which restores to the poor man in cities the possi- 
bility of making a home for his wife and children. To this 
end, the municipality should lay down strict rules, deter- 
mined by experts, as to the height, floor space, air space, 
and number of families to be accommodated, according to 
which all tenements built by private owners shall be con- 
structed. New York took a considerable stride in this 
direction by its tenement house law of 1901, but the 
remedy is far from being sufficient. The municipality 
should employ its credit to purchase tracts of unoccupied 
land upon which to erect model homes for workingmen 
amid pleasant and sanitary surroundings, and rent, or sell 
them, at a moderate profit. 

To such a scheme the objection will be made that it is 
rank paternalism. I answer that paternalism is justified 
when private initiative fails to root out an evil that is sap- 
ping the vitality of the nation at its root — the home life of 
the people. Again, it will be objected that municipal 
management is often, if not generally, characterized by 
carelessness, extravagance, and fraud. The all-sufficient 
answer is, first, that no amount of plundering and blunder- 
ing on the part of municipal authorities could equal in its bad 
effects the evil wrought by the heartlessness and rapacity 



328 PRESENT PROBLEMS OF THE SCHOOL 

of tenement landlords ; and, in the second place, that 
experience amply demonstrates that committees of citizens, 
serving without remuneration, through salaried experts, 
manage vast undertakings and enormous properties with 
economy and efficiency. The essential condition is that 
the undertaking should be large enough to warrant the 
employment of experts of first-class ability. 

The school should and must at all waking hours do all 
that its resources permit, to supply what the home, even 
under the most favorable conditions, loses by moving from 
agricultural to urban life ; but if the home and its whole- 
some influences are not to be obliterated among the city 
poor, the city must see to it that the so-called working 
classes are enabled to live in homes where homely virtues 
have a chance to flourish and where children have space 
to play. 

FEEDING SCHOOL CHILDREN 

But there is still another aspect of physical education. 
Education, whether physical or mental, is seriously retarded, 
if not practically impossible, when the body is improperly 
or imperfectly nourished. The child of poverty, with body 
emaciated, blood thin, and nerves on edge, because he has 
not enough to eat, grows up stunted in body and in mind. 
What a farce it is to talk of the schools providing equal 
opportunities for all when there are hundreds of thousands 
of children in our city schools who cannot learn because 
they are always hungry ! The schools of Paris provide at 
cost price a simple, wholesome mid-day meal for their hun- 
gry children. In many places in the British Islands the 
same thing is being done. Should we do less in the cities 



EDUCATIONAL REVIEW, NOVEMBER, 1904 329 

of democratic America ? In no other way can we be sure 
that the schools will, as' far as education may, provide equal 
opportunities for all. 

TIME LIMITS OF ELEMENTARY AND SECONDARY EDUCATION 

Another of the very serious problems of school adminis- 
tration confronting us at present is the division of time as 
between the elementary school and the high school. The 
customary division assigns two years, from the ages of four 
to six, to the kindergarten ; eight years, from six to four- 
teen, to the elementary school ; and four years, from 
fourteen to eighteen, to the high or secondary school. If 
it is true, as is now generally believed, that the period of 
childhood closes at twelve, that the period of youth begins 
at thirteen, and that the child and the youth need different 
subject matter and different methods of teaching, it is obvi- 
ous that a distribution of time which requires two years of 
the period of youth to.be spent under school conditions fit 
only for the child, is open to most serious objections. 
Specifically stated, these objections are as follows: — 

First, the present arrangement causes the loss of valu- 
able time by prolonging for two years a method of teaching 
that is fitted only for children ; second, it unduly defers 
and therefore unjustly abbreviates the time devoted to 
foreign languages, to the higher mathematics, and to 
science ; and third, in cities where school accommodations 
are limited in proportion to the number of children, it is 
wasteful, because while the classrooms occupied by grades 
of the first six years are crowded, those devoted to the 
seventh and eighth years are often partially empty. 

In order to obviate the waste of effort, of time, and of 



330 PRESENT PROBLEMS OF THE SCHOOL 

space involved in the present organization of schools, I 
suggest the following arrangement : — 

i. School life, above the kindergarten age, should be 
divided into two equal periods — the elementary, corre- 
sponding to the epoch of childhood, and the secondary, 
corresponding to the epoch of youth. Each period would 
provide for six years of school work — the elementary, 
from six to twelve ; the secondary, from thirteen to eigh- 
teen. 

2. For economic reasons, inasmuch as children leave 
school rapidly after they are of age to go to work, the 
secondary schools should be of two kinds, which might 
be called the preacademic and the academic. The pre- 
academic schools would provide three years of work, from 
thirteen to fifteen, and would be established at convenient 
points selected with a view to accommodate the children 
promoted from the elementary schools. The academic 
schools, which would be comparatively few in number and 
established only in crowded centers, would provide another 
three years of work for youths from sixteen to eighteen. 
In this way space would be economized, much more work 
would be accomplished, and it may be reasonably antici- 
pated that our young men and young women, before leav- 
ing the high school or academy, would have covered most, 
if not all, of the work that is now accomplished by the end 
of the sophomore year in the average college. A begin- 
ning of this plan has been made in several cities by the 
enrichment of the last two years of the elementary course 
of study, through the introduction of a foreign language, 
algebra, and elementary physics. The gradually extend- 
ing use of the departmental system of teaching, by which 



EDUCATIONAL REVIEW, NOVEMBER, 1904 331 

one teacher, instead of teaching all subjects for a year or 
half a year, teaches one subject through two years, is also 
contributing to the same result. Teachers who teach sub- 
jects for which they have special talent and preparation, 
and in which they are interested, to pupils thirteen and 
fourteen years of age, are almost certain to adopt methods 
suitable to the period of youth rather than to the period of 
childhood. 

THE ELEMENTARY CURRICULUM 

After the problem of the distribution of time comes the 
problem of the elementary curriculum. What studies shall 
be pursued by children between the ages of six and thirteen ? 
The answer to this question is found in the fundamental 
assumption that mental education is the gradual adjustment 
of the child to his spiritual environment. 

President Butler was probably the first to advance 
this view of education as a development of Mr. John 
Fiske's discovery that the prolonged period of infancy in 
the human race lies at the foundation of family life. Presi- 
dent Butler defines our spiritual environment as "the 
spiritual possessions or inheritances of the race." 1 These 
spiritual inheritances he classifies as our scientific inher- 
itance, our literary inheritance, our artistic inheritance, 
our institutional inheritance, and our religious inheritance. 
As education is the work of the school, it is obviously, then, 
its function to introduce the child to his spiritual inherit- 
ances. As a recent writer has well expressed the thought : 
" This production from within the mind of its own world 
in response to the stimulating effects of the world without 

1 Butler, "The Meaning of Education," p. 17. 



332 PRESENT PROBLEMS OF THE SCHOOL 

is education as a process, as an activity. . . . What his 
race has produced, he (the youth) reproduces, and thus 
universalizes his individual nature and socializes his private 
impulses." 1 

This philosophic view of education which calls, as far as 
may be, for the reproduction in the individual of what has 
been produced by the race, is responsible for large additions 
to the elementary curriculum. At the same time, and in 
•entire harmony with the philosophic view, there has been a 
constantly growing demand on the part of the people for 
the teaching of such subjects as carpentry, sewing, and 
cooking. Hence there has arisen the problem of the 
curriculum. Since we can teach but a small fraction of our 
spiritual inheritances, on what principle shall we make the 
selections ? How shall we avoid giving teachers more to 
teach than they can teach well, and pupils more to learn 
than they can learn well ? How shall we prevent what is 
popularly known as the " overcrowding " of the elementary 
curriculum ? 

Twenty-five years ago the average elementary school in 
America taught reading, writing, spelling, grammar, geog- 
raphy, United States history, and what was called civics. 
In order to fill in the time, arithmetical rules of no possible 
use in life were taught, and the children's wits were exer- 
cised or blunted by outlandish mathematical puzzles ; a 
manual of United States history and the Constitution of 
the United States were learned by heart ; long lists of 
meaningless names were memorized in geography ; parsing 
with the utmost detail was continuous; drawing, where 
drawing was taught, was exclusively from flat copies ; 

1 Home, " The Philosophy of Education," p. ioo. 



EDUCATIONAL REVIEW, NOVEMBER, 1904 333 

and the crowning glory of the school was held to be 
the ability to spell sesquipedalian words whose signification 
had never dawned upon the childish intellect. The lack of 
intelligence in this work is to be accounted for by two facts : 
first, that teachers were not as well educated or trained as 
they are to-day ; and second, that in the absence of interest- 
ing subject matter, they required their pupils to commit 
to memory dry and useless details in order to fill up the 
prescribed time. The additions that have been gradually 
made are nature study, which is intended to train what 
President Eliot calls " capacities for productiveness and 
enjoyment" through the progressive acquisition of an ele- 
mentary knowledge of the outside world ; algebra, chiefly 
as an aid, through the equation to the solution of arith- 
metical problems ; inventional geometry ; literature, studied 
as such, distinct from the ordinary reading lesson ; language 
and composition, as the art of expression ; drawing from 
objects; and manual training and other physical exercises. 
This seems a long list of subjects, and yet every subject is 
justified and required by the fundamental assumption that 
the school exists for the progressive adaptation of the child's 
mind to its spiritual environment. In other words, each 
child has a right to the acquisition not only of the tools of 
knowledge, but at least to the beginnings of a knowledge 
of literature, of science, of art, of institutions, and of ethics, 
so that when he leaves school he may be able to continue 
along the road on which he has started. Educators through- 
out the United States are now practically agreed that each 
of these great divisions of knowledge should be represented 
in some way in each year of the course. 

How, then, has room been made, or may room be made, 



334 PRESENT PROBLEMS OF THE SCHOOL 

for the new subject matter and the new activities ? In 
the first place, through the correlation of studies, the re- 
enforcing of one study through other studies, as the cor- 
relation of history with geography, and of composition 
with literature. In the second place, through improved 
methods of teaching, so that more work is accomplished 
in a given time. The early introduction of the idea of 
ratio in arithmetic, and the use of the phonetic method in 
teaching reading, are cases in point. It is safe to say that 
when reading is scientifically taught the average child reads 
better at the end of the first year in school than twenty-five 
years ago he could read at the end of the third year, and 
that he actually reads five times as much matter during 
the first three school years as he read during the same 
period a quarter of a century ago. In the third place, 
time may be saved by lopping off useless and wearisome 
detail in all subjects. To a considerable extent this prun- 
ing process has been applied in the best schools. 

That the memorizing of unnecessary details has not al- 
together gone out of fashion, however, is shown by the 
recent exposure of methods of teaching history in the 
high schools of one of our most enlightened states. One 
hundred students who entered a state normal school were 
asked to write answers to the question, How were you 
taught history in the public school ? Of the one hundred, 
sixty-two answered that they had " memorized the text- 
book and recited it word for word as nearly as possible." : 
But history is not the only subject in which children's 
time is wasted and their interest destroyed by memoriter 
methods. In geography, in grammar, in arithmetic, even 

1 Educational Review, May, 1904. 



EDUCATIONAL REVIEW, NOVEMBER, 1904 335 

in nature study, it is still not unusual to find teachers con- 
suming their pupils' time in memorizing unessential details 
and a vast redundancy of technical terms. 

Mr. Frank McMurry lays down the following plain 
rules for the rejection of superfluous subject matter in 
teaching: — 

(1) Whatever cannot be shown to have a plain relation 
to some real need of life, whether it be aesthetic, ethical, or 
utilitarian in the narrow sense, must be dropped. 

(2) Whatever is not reasonably within the child's com- 
prehension, likewise. 

(3) Whatever is unlikely to appeal to his interest ; un- 
less it is positively demanded for the first very weighty 
reason. 

(4) Whatever topics and details are so isolated or ir- 
relevant that they fail to be a part of any series or chain 
of ideas, and therefore fail to be necessary for the appre- 
ciation of any large point. This standard, however, not 
to apply to the three R's and spelling. 1 

The intelligent application by teachers of these four 
rules, together with the more general dissemination of im- 
proved methods of teaching, will gradually solve the prob- 
lem of the " overcrowding of the elementary curriculum." 

THE ELECTIVE SYSTEM IN HIGH SCHOOLS 

The elective system, which has obtained so firm a foot- 
ing in American colleges and universities, has spread to 
the secondary schools, while there are not wanting those 
who argue in favor of introducing it into the elementary 

1 Educational Revieiv, May, 1904. 



336 PRESENT PROBLEMS OF THE SCHOOL 

schools. Some would go so far as to say that a youth of 
fourteen should be permitted while in high school to pur- 
sue as many studies or as few studies, for as long a time 
or for as short a time, as he pleases. Though there are 
few who take this extreme view, yet the elective principle 
has found a firm lodgment in the secondary school. For 
the most part it takes the form of a choice between a 
college preparatory course, a commercial course, and a 
manual training course, or a choice between two or more 
related subjects of study. If we assume, as I think we 
must, that the principle of election has been firmly estab- 
lished in the secondary schools, the problem which at once 
arises is: How shall the student be guided to a wise choice 
of courses and of subjects ? Obviously, when he enters, 
the teachers of the secondary schools cannot advise him, 
because when he presents himself at their doors they know 
nothing of his special aptitudes and little of his previous 
studies. In the great majority of cases, parents are quite 
as incompetent as his new teachers to give him useful 
counsel. How is the boy, at the age of fourteen, to deter- 
mine whether he shall take the college preparatory course, 
or the commercial course, or the manual training course? 
Here is a problem of the first importance. It is of the 
first importance to the boy himself, because his future 
happiness and success in life depend in no small measure 
on the prudence with which he makes his selection. It 
is of the first importance to society, because there is no 
economic waste comparable in its proportions to that oc- 
casioned by setting people to work for which they have 
no natural aptitude. How, then, is the problem to be 
solved ? I fear we must lay the burden in the first in- 



EDUCATIONAL REVIEW, NOVEMBER, 1904 337 

stance on the elementary school — a burden which that 
institution has hitherto made but little effort to assume. 
That the elementary school has not done more to guide 
the future academic work of its pupils is generally attrib- 
uted to one or other of two causes, neither of which I be- 
lieve to be tenable. In the first place, it is claimed that 
the elementary school presents the same subject matter 
and the same activities to all pupils, and therefore turns 
out a machine-made — I believe that is the term generally 
employed — a machine-made product that is alike in all 
its parts. The answer is that the elementary school must 
of necessity present the same subjects and the same ac- 
tivities to all its pupils, because these subjects and these 
activities constitute the necessary food and the necessary 
training of the child mind ; that the use of the same studies 
and the same exercises does not result in producing the 
same type of mind and disposition, because different minds, 
according to inherent capacities, react in different ways 
upon the same stimuli ; and, finally, that the intellectual 
capacities, dispositions, and tendencies of the graduates of 
the elementary schools are actually not alike, but as various 
as there are individuals. The second criticism is that the 
bright pupil is made to keep step with the dull pupil. 
" Marking time " is the phrase used in the educational 
cant of the day. To properly administered schools this 
criticism does not apply. Even if it did, however, the pity 
lavished on the particularly bright pupil is largely wasted. 
He can generally take care of himself. Our sympathy is 
needed, not for the bright, precocious pupil, but for his 
duller, though not on that account less able, associate. 
The problem really is, not how to drive the bright pupil 



33S PRESENT PROBLEMS OF THE SCHOOL 

through the grades at railroad speed, but how to give the 
slower pupil the assistance — but little will be needed in 
the majority of cases — that will help him over obstacles 
and enable him to keep up with his more brilliant com- 
panions. Any school which lavishes the time and energy 
of its ablest teachers on the more brilliant, to the neglect 
of the duller pupils, falls far short of its duty. 

The fault, then, lies neither in the sameness of the cur- 
riculum nor in the retardation of bright pupils, but in the 
failure of elementary school principals and teachers to 
realize their responsibility for the future welfare of their 
pupils. Where, on the other hand, all pupils have equal 
opportunity and equal advantages, there the teachers, if 
they take an interest, may note the different reactions pro- 
duced by identical stimuli on different minds, and advise 
the boy of literary ability to take the college preparatory 
course, the one with business instincts to take the com- 
mercial course, and the one with a turn for mechanics to 
pursue the manual training or mechanic arts course. In 
this way the elementary school may become of much 
greater benefit to society than it is at present. 

The elementary school can, however, guide only the 
first steps of the student. After he has fully entered 
upon the work of the secondary school, it becomes one 
of the chief duties of that institution to train him to 
make intelligent selection among courses and subjects of 
study. 

There remain to be considered three problems of the 
highest importance in the administration of the American 
school — the problem of compulsory attendance, the problem 
of the supply of teachers, and the problem of finance. 



EDUCATIONAL REVIEW, NOVEMBER, 1904 339 

COMPULSORY EDUCATION 

Most of the northern states of the Union have enacted 
compulsory education laws, more or less stringent in their 
nature. These laws are not, however, strictly enforced. 
In the South there is not even a pretense made of compul- 
sory school attendance. Several reasons may be assigned 
for the laxity that undoubtedly exists in the enforcement 
of compulsory education laws : a widespread repugnance 
to state interference with the supposed liberties of parents ; 
the opposition of the employers of child labor, such as the 
cotton manufacturers of the South, the coal-mine owners of 
Pennsylvania, the glassmakers of New Jersey, the sweat- 
shops of New York, and the small traders in all large cities ; 
the opposition of private schools which dread a diversion 
of their children to the public school ; the opposition of 
some foreign-born, non-English-speaking communities, 
founded on the fear that their children would, in the public 
school, lose the use of their native tongue ; and, lastly, the 
lack of adequate administrative machinery for the enforce- 
ment of existing laws. 

Gradually to overcome this widespread 'opposition to 
compulsory school attendance, the following measures are 
suggested : — 

1. Governmental registration and inspection of all private 
and parochial schools, to the end that no school may be 
permitted to exist which does not teach its pupils the Eng- 
lish language and the elementary duties of citizenship. 
There should be no interference — public opinion in Amer- 
ica would not tolerate any interference — with endowed, 
proprietary, or sectarian schools, if such interference would 



340 PRESENT PROBLEMS OF THE SCHOOL 

in any way limit the liberty of teaching or the rights of 
parents to determine the schools in which their children 
shall be trained. Such interference on the part of the state 
should be forbidden for educational as well as political 
reasons, because the competition of private schools is es- 
sential to the well-being and the growth of public schools. 
On the other hand, the state owes it to society, and society 
owes it to itself, to see to it that all its future citizens, either 
in public or in private schools, are taught the English 
language and at least an elementary knowledge of American 
history and institutions, and that they are taught by per- 
sons who are qualified to teach. 

2. The registration of all children in large cities. If 
such a measure is necessary in the comparatively stable 
population of Paris, in order to secure a strict enforcement 
of a compulsory education law, how much more necessary 
is it in a city like New York or Chicago, in which popula- 
tion is constantly shifting over a widely extended urban 
territory, and to which is added annually an enormous 
influx of non-English-speaking foreigners ? 

3. The education of society to a realizing sense of the 
necessity on social grounds of a strict enforcement of a 
reasonable compulsory education law. The great truth 
must be brought home to all that the man who fails to 
educate his children commits a twofold sin — a sin against 
his children, whom he deprives, as far as his power goes, 
of the ability to live happy and prosperous lives ; and a 
sin against society, which suffers and deteriorates in propor- 
tion as its members fail to participate in the spiritual in- 
heritances of the race and fail to receive that training for 
citizenship which springs from association in the exercises 



EDUCATIONAL REVIEW, NOVEMBER, 1904 341 

of the school. On the other hand, I may justly claim for 
my country that there is no other in which education is 
more generally appreciated, or in which it is pursued with 
greater zeal. The enthusiasm of the many will not, how- 
ever, atone for the indifference of the few. 

THE SUPPLY OF TEACHERS 

The problem of the supply of teachers presents three 
principal phases : — 

1. How shall teachers be trained ? 

2. How shall teachers be appointed ? 

3. Shall women teachers continue in the vast majority 
in American schools ? 

THE TRAINING OF TEACHERS 

There are two prevailing types of method in training 
teachers, whether in the university, the normal school, or 
the city training school : that which regards the study of 
the science and art of teaching as incidental to the acquisi- 
tion of scholarship, and that which looks upon it as a pursuit 
requiring the undivided attention of the student. Just as 
the professions of medicine, law, theology, and engineering 
now require that the intending licentiate shall devote some 
years to the exclusive study of the principles and technique 
of his future work, so it may be confidently predicted that 
in the not distant future every person who is to teach our 
children shall be required not only to reach a high stand- 
ard in scholarship, but to devote from two to four years 
to special preparation for the most delicate and difficult of 
all arts — the art of training children. 



342 PRESENT PROBLEMS OF THE SCHOOL 

HOW SHOULD TEACHERS BE APPOINTED? 

Up to forty years ago the conception was widely preva- 
lent throughout the United States that any one who knew 
enough to keep ahead of his pupils in their lessons was 
sufficiently well instructed to be appointed a teacher. The 
natural result of this generally accepted view was the ap- 
pointing of teachers by citizen committees who were too 
often swayed by prejudice, favor, or political and religious 
considerations. As a higher conception of the school and 
its functions and of the teacher and his duties has gained 
ground, we are slowly, but surely, realizing the necessity 
of a method of appointment and promotion that will relieve 
the teacher from humiliation and the schools from the 
incubus of political management. Two plans have been 
somewhat widely tried : appointment by a single expert, 
supervisor or superintendent, and appointment as the result 
of competitive examination. Appointment by a superin- 
tendent has been known to lead to the displacement of an 
honest and fearless official and the substitution of one who 
is subservient to political control, and is not likely to be 
extended. Appointment by competitive examination, on 
the other hand, while it may not always attract the right 
persons to the right places, is slowly, but surely, gaining 
ground. It has raised the standard of scholarship and pro- 
fessional equipment among teachers. As a general rule, 
it selects the best from among a mass of applicants for a 
given position ; and it preserves the self-respect of the 
individual teacher, because it frees him from the necessity 
of begging or cringing for a position, and enables him to 
feel that he obtains appointment or promotion solely upon 



EDUCATIONAL REVIEW, NOVEMBER, 1904 343 

his own merits. As communities awake to the necessity 
of delivering their schools from the abhorrent influences 
of political and ecclesiastical patronage, we may look to 
see a more rapid spread of this method of appointing and 
promoting teachers. 



"FEMINIZATION OF AMERICAN SCHOOLS 

Attention has recently been attracted by the report of 
the Moseley Commission to what has been called the femini- 
zation of American schools, because the great majority of 
public-school teachers are women. It was an economic 
reason, in the first instance — the fact that women work 
for smaller wages than men — that led to the present pre- 
ponderance of the feminine element in the teaching force. 
It is more than doubtful, however, whether American 
schools and American education have deteriorated in con- 
sequence. It is quite certain that the refined woman of 
to-day who has been thoroughly trained is a much better 
teacher than the coarse, ignorant, pedantic schoolmaster 
of fifty years ago, who excited no feeling but contempt, 
hatred, or terror in the breasts of his pupils. We all believe 
in the salutary influence of the masculine mind in teaching, 
particularly in the case of older pupils, but we also believe 
that the influence of a strong woman is better than that of 
a weak man ; and that a woman teacher of ability who is 
devoting her life to educational work is apt to be a better 
teacher than the male fledgling who takes up teaching as a 
makeshift, and whose mind is set, not upon education as a 
career, but upon law or medicine. In short, to increase 
the efficiency of the public school teaching force by in- 
creasing the number of efficient men teachers — men who 



344 



PRESENT PROBLEMS OF THE SCHOOL 



would devote their lives to the work — would involve a 
largely increased expenditure of money, in order to induce 
such men to make teaching their life work. And this 
brings me to my last problem — the problem of finance. 

FINANCIAL SUPPORT OF PUBLIC EDUCATION 

If we are to have schoolhouses properly equipped for 
the training of the body as well as the mind — for manual 
training, play, gymnastics, and athletics ; if all children 
are to enjoy their God-given right to education ; if schools 
are to be equipped for scientific as well as literary studies; 
if salaries are to be paid to teachers that will attract men 
and women of breeding and refinement to the teaching 
profession ; and if all the teachers are to be thoroughly 
trained, so that they will be models to imitate and persons 
capable of arousing interest and inspiring effort, — if all 
these things are to be accomplished, it is evident that the 
sums devoted to education in America, enormous as they 
are, must be very greatly increased. For effective purposes, 
the revenue of a public school system ought to possess two 
characteristics : first, it should be ample ; and second, it 
should be stable. It should be sufficiently ample in each 
community to provide schooling for all children in classes 
not to exceed forty to a teacher, and in adequately equipped 
buildings ; to pay teachers reasonable salaries, so that they 
may be able to live in refined surroundings and take ad- 
vantage of opportunities for self-improvement ; and to 
provide pensions after retirement, so that while in active 
service they may be relieved of anxiety regarding provision 
for old age. It should be stable, so that the educational 
authorities may be able to carry out a consistent and pro- 



EDUCATIONAL REVIEW, NOVEMBER, 1904 345 

gressive policy. It should not be subject to the whims 
and caprices of the politicians who control the municipal 
administration of our large cities. It should not be fluctuat- 
ing from year to year, and thus lead to the establishment 
of activities one year which must be abandoned for lack of 
funds the next. 

I have selected from among the innumerable problems 
in school administration which now confront the people of 
the United States those that seem most important and 
most urgent, and I have ventured in each case to suggest 
a solution. Every solution proposed involves an increased 
expenditure of money. Immeasurably more effective, 
however, than money — vital though money is — to uplift 
the school, are the love and skill of the devoted teacher. 
Love for children and teaching skill are the greatest things 
in the school. 



XXXI 

THE AMERICAN TEACHER— A CODE OF 

ETHICS 

(From the Convocation Address at the University of Chicago, 
December 16, igo2) 

THE right of the state to educate is in this country 
almost universally admitted. That right rests upon 
no unsubstantial or visionary foundation. It is implied in 
the end for which men have established government. The 
end of government is to accomplish the objects of organized 
society. Among the chief objects of organized society are, 
first, the development of the best powers — intellectual, 
moral, and physical — of the individual; and second, 
equality of opportunity in the pursuit of whatever makes 
life worth living. Universal education is the one essential 
condition under which these objects may be realized. 
Without universal education there cannot be universal 
individual development. Without universal education 
there cannot be equality of opportunity for all. To pro- 
vide, to insure, and to compel universal education is an 
undertaking far beyond the powers of any authority short 
of the state itself. As John Stuart Mill argued, because 
parents are unable or unwilling to provide the best educa- 
tion for their children, or, being able and willing to provide 
education, do not know what the best education is, the 
state must undertake the work. 

346 



ADDRESS, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, 1902 347 

Without universal education, moreover, no government 
that rests upon popular action can long endure. Where 
the people are sovereign, the people must be schooled in 
the knowledge and in the virtues upon which free institu- 
tions depend. 1 If for no other reason, public schools are 
necessary to keep alive the traditions of our history ; are 
necessary lest we forget the glories of Yorktown and 
Bunker Hill, the principles of the Declaration, and the 
memories of Washington and Lincoln. 

In words of weighty import, Andrew D. White has 
warned the United States of the danger of neglecting 
popular education. " A number of great republics, 
officered by great men," he has said, " have existed in the 
world. Their history has been very brilliant, and yet, of 
them all, only two remain — only two can be said to have 
lasted." (He regards the Republic of France as still only 
an experiment.) " I am speaking of Switzerland and the 
United States. Those two republics differ from all the 
others in only one particular. Other republics have been 
deeply religious. The republic at Florence was as deeply 
religious as any community that ever existed. They have 
had every virtue except an enlightened body of citizens. 
Switzerland and the United States have that." The 
lessons of recorded history are in harmony with the 
theory that the enlightenment of the great body of citizens 
through universal education is the sole condition under 
which a republic can endure. 

But then the question arises : What is education ? There 
have been some great definitions of education — all sub- 
limely true, but each open to some objection. When 

1 Woodrow Wilson, "The State," p. 667. 



348 THE AMERICAN TEACHER — A CODE OF ETHICS 

Comenius says, " Things that should be done must be 
learned by doing " ; when John Dewey says, " Education 
is not preparation for life, it is life " ; when Pestalozzi 
says, " Education is a generation of power " ; when Froebel 
says that education is " the harmonious growth of the 
body, mind, and soul," we all feel the force of the words, 
but we also realize that the language is too mystical for 
general comprehension. Even when Colonel Parker grew 
eloquent — and when was he not eloquent ? — on the ideal 
school as the ideal community, we could not, when released 
from the spell he wove around us, help feeling that there 
was something lacking — that he was describing the ideal 
conditions for education rather than ideal education 
itself. 

Perhaps the first approach to a scientific definition of 
education was that made by John Stuart Mill in his St. 
Andrews address. Education, he says, is "the culture 
which each generation purposely gives to those who are to 
be its successors, in order to qualify them for at least 
keeping up, and, if possible, for raising, the improvement 
which has been attained." President Butler has shown 
that there is a scientific basis for Mr. Mill's definition 
which Mr. Mill himself probably never suspected, because 
he never realized the full significance of the doctrine of 
evolution. President Butler takes as the starting point of 
educational science John Fiske's great contribution to the 
evolutionary theory that the prolonged period of infancy in 
the human race which is necessary to bring about the ad- 
justments — physical and spiritual — of the child to its 
environment, lies at the foundation of the human family, 
and therefore at the foundation of society and of institu- 



ADDRESS, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, 1902 349 

tional life. 1 " After the physical adjustment," as Dr. 
Butler puts it, " is reasonably complete, there remains yet 
to be accomplished the building of harmonious and recip- 
rocal relations with those great acquisitions of the race 
that constitute civilization ; and therefore the lengthening 
period of infancy simply means that we are spending 
nearly half of the life of each generation in order to de- 
velop in the young some conception of the vast requirements 
of the historic past and some mastery of the conditions of 
the immediate present. 2 In other words, the doctrine of 
evolution teaches us to look upon education as the work 
of adapting and adjusting our self-active organisms to the 
acquisitions and attainments of the race which have well 
been called our spiritual inheritances." 

Our spiritual inheritances Dr. Butler classifies as our 
scientific inheritance, our literary inheritance, our aesthetic 
inheritance, our institutional inheritance, and our religious 
inheritance. This classification is sufficiently comprehen- 
sive. No part of the achievements of the human race — 
not science, not literature, not art, not history and laws, not 
religion — may be omitted from the work of education. 
For one and all of them, if our republic is to be preserved 
through the enlightenment of its citizens, if all our citizens 
are to have equal opportunity for individual development 
and for advancement, place must be found in the education 
of the school and the education of the home. 

And yet there still seems something lacking. A man 
may, like Coleridge, have entered generously into the 
spiritual inheritance of the race, and yet remain an eater 
of opium and a dreamer of dreams ; he may hide his talent 

1 Butler, " The Meaning of Education," p. 10. 2 Ibid., p. 13. 



350 THE AMERICAN TEACHER — A CODE OF ETHICS 

in a napkin and have nothing to show for his stewardship; 
he may wrap himself in the cloak of selfishness or pour 
forth his strength in sensuality ; and the world is full of 
examples of men of great intellectual attainments who have 
oppressed and maltreated their fellow men ; all these things 
and more a man may do in spite of his intellectual acquisi- 
tions, unless he has developed certain qualities of mind and 
heart without which neither knowledge nor riches avails. 

Mr. Benjamin Kidd in his great work on "Social Evolution" 
has, to my mind, made a most important contribution to 
the theory of education which may help us to find what 
seems lacking in the definitions of Mill and Butler, and to 
explain what is mystical in the definitions of Froebel and 
Pestalozzi. He first shows that the stupendous achieve- 
ments of the human mind during the nineteenth century 
in mathematics, in pure science, and in the applications of 
science to industry were not the colossal products of indi- 
vidual minds, but " the results of small accumulations of 
knowledge slowly and painfully made and added to by 
many minds through an indefinite number of generations 
in the past, every addition to this store of knowledge af- 
fording still greater facilities for further additions." So 
far, Mr. Kidd's doctrine of progress is in accord with Mill's 
and Butler's theories of education. But then he finds an- 
other element. It is not so much intellectual capacity, he 
claims, that has caused the evolution of the highest civil- 
ization, but the development of certain other qualities which 
we may call ethical, moral, or religious. " A preponderating 
element," he says, " in the type of character which the evo- 
lutionary forces at work in human society are slowly de- 
veloping, would appear to be the sense of reverence. The 



ADDRESS, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, 1902 351 

qualities with which it is tending to be closely allied are 
great mental energy, resolution, enterprise, power of pro- 
longed and concentrated application, and a sense of simple- 
minded devotion to conceptions of duty." It would appear, 
therefore, that in any educational scheme to exalt a nation, 
we must include not only the acquisition of our intellectual 
inheritance, but also the development of the ethical quali- 
ties of reverence, resolution, power of prolonged and con- 
centrated application, and simple-minded devotion to con- 
ceptions of duty. Quite recently President Eliot in a notable 
address traced the existence of many of the ills to which 
modern society is heir — the gambling habit, the drink 
habit, the reading of ephemeral and degrading literature, 
and the appeal to force instead of to reason as in strikes and 
mob violence — to the failure of the schools to train the in- 
telligence, the reasoning powers of their pupils. Doubtless 
there is much truth in the statement, and President Eliot 
did a great public service in calling attention to the truth. 
But is it not also true that these very evils are due quite as 
much to the lack of moral principle as to the lack of rea- 
soning power ? Gambling and intemperance are quite 
compatible with high intellectual attainments, but not with 
reverence and simple-minded devotion to conceptions of 
duty. 

Again, does not the adjustment of the child to his en- 
vironment in that process which we call life, necessarily 
involve an ethical as well as an intellectual element ? Not 
only is the child molded by the environment into which he 
is born, but for good or for evil he helps to modify that 
environment. He has his influence on all with whom he 
comes in contact Every action he performs produces 



352 THE AMERICAN TEACHER — A CODE OF ETHICS 

some reaction in others. Are these reactions good in their 
tendency, or are they evil ? Surely this is a question every 
man should put to himself. Surely every child should 
learn to ask himself : What will be the effect of this action 
of mine upon my fellows ? Will it injure them ? Will it 
help them ? In defining education, accordingly, in terms 
of the adjustment of man to his environment, we must not, 
while seeking for the influence of environment on man, 
forget that man influences environment, that action always 
begets reaction. Education ought to train men to trans- 
form their environment for the better. And this is of the 
very essence of morality. 

Now, if education is necessary to conserve the two main 
objects for which society is organized — to promote indi- 
vidual development and to secure equality of opportunity 
to all ; if, further, universal education is necessary to the 
preservation of our republican institutions ; and if, lastly, 
education involves the development of the highest ethical 
qualities, as well as the acquisition of our intellectual in- 
heritance, in order to adjust the child to his environment; 
surely it follows that the persons to whom this all-impor- 
tant work is intrusted cannot be too accomplished, cannot 
be too highly trained, and cannot be held to too rigid 
an accountability. If we think of the teacher's work as 
the foundation and the safeguard of our political institu- 
tions, we may not unreasonably suppose that he should 
possess some of the attributes of a statesman. If we keep 
before our minds the vast task of introducing the young 
into their intellectual inheritance, we may look for the 
mark of the philosopher. If we think of his duties in the 
inculcation of a high morality, we may regard him as " an 



ADDRESS, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, 1902 353 

under-shepherd of the Lord's little ones," even as a great 
evangelist. If we think of the battles he is called upon to 
fight, especially in our great cities, against ignorance and 
vice and against the abhorrent forces that would prostitute 
the public schools to selfish purposes -and drag them in the 
mire of party politics, we may think of him as the soldier 
of a hundred battles. Ofttimes, too, when we see his 
high-mindedness in presence of affront, his fortitude in 
resisting tyranny, and his patience in opposing intrigue 
and enduring scandal, we should not be far amiss in plac- 
ing the crown of martyrdom on his brow. There are few in 
whom are found mixed all these qualities of the ideal teacher. 
One such there was, however, whom Chicago knew well — 
Francis Parker. Him the University of Chicago delighted 
to honor, for he was a statesman, and he was a philosopher, 
and he was an evangelist, and he was a soldier, and in very 
truth he was a martyr. The memory of such a martyr 
is the seed of the schools. To few in any age are given 
the great abilities and the great opportunities that made 
Francis Parker the heroic figure he was. Yet none need 
despair. The opportunities for efficiency come to every 
teacher. The humblest mistress in a country school, who 
inspires her pupils with the thirst for knowledge, the love 
of truth, and the desire for the higher life, is as truly in 
the class of real teachers as Socrates or Froebel, Pestalozzi 
or Parker. 

And yet the most ardent admirer of our public school 
system will be constrained to admit that teaching, except 
in the case of college or university teaching, is not recog- 
nized as one of the learned professions, as the professions 
of law, medicine, and theology are recognized ; that public 



354 THE AMERICAN TEACHER — A CODE OF ETHICS 

school teachers are not doing all that might reasonably be 
expected to foster the growth of intelligence and morality ; 
and that they neither meet with that social and financial 
recognition nor exercise that influence in the community 
which the supreme importance of their calling deserves 
and demands. 

How are we to account for this strange anomaly — that 
teachers should be called upon to do the work which is 
most needed to preserve the republic and yet receive so 
little recognition, either financially or socially, at the hands 
of the people whom they serve ? Some would account for 
it by the undoubted fact that the teacher's calling leaves 
its mark on the teacher and by so much unfits him for gen- 
eral society. Charles Lamb gave expression to this view 
when he asked the question, " Why are we never quite at 
ease in the presence of a schoolmaster ? " " Because," he 
answers, "we are conscious that he is not quite at his ease 
in ours. He is awkward and out of place in the society of 
his equals. He comes, like Gulliver, from among his 
little people, and he cannot fit the stature of his under- 
standing to yours. He is so used to teaching that he 
wants to be teaching you." 

The unerring shaft of Lamb's genial satire discovers a 
weak point in our harness and inflicts a wound — though a 
wound that is not mortal. May not we teachers retaliate 
by asking what calling there is that does not leave its 
mark, physical or intellectual, on him who follows it ? The 
blacksmith through the constant use of his brawny right 
arm becomes lop-sided ; the sailor rolls in his walk on land 
as a ship rolls at sea ; the popular physician acquires 
blandness of manner and a deferential smile and the habit 



ADDRESS, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, 1902 355 

of never committing himself lest he should afterwards be 
convicted of error; the preacher rarely throws aside his 
preaching voice ; while the lawyer speaks of ordinary 
matters in the language of his brief, and is always " object- 
ing" to your conclusions or cross-examining you on your 
facts. The truth is that all vocations leave their impress 
on the physical and intellectual man. It is only the very 
strongest souls that preserve their perfect poise and keep 
themselves free from the mannerisms of their calling. 
This, then, cannot be the reason why teachers receive so 
little recognition. 

Others would account for the schoolmaster's position at 
present and for the ridicule that has been heaped upon 
him in literature by the deplorable fact that from time im- 
memorial he has used corporal punishment as an element 
in teaching. There is only too much truth in the state- 
ment. Everywhere, doubtless, the conduct of the schools 
is to-day far more humane than it was in the Middle Ages, 
when, to use Oscar Browning's words, teaching was con- 
ducted amid the shouts of the teachers and the lamenta- 
tions of the taught. It has grown more humane even 
during the last ten years. And yet, we who are seeking 
a better way cannot free ourselves from the contumely 
that has come down to us from two thousand years of 
cruelty to children. Though we must endure this re- 
proach, we should not be surprised at it. Cruelty is the 
characteristic of the savage ; loving-kindness, of the civil- 
ized man. The humane man or woman not only hates 
cruelty in and for itself, but despises it in the teacher 
as evidence of lack of skill in his calling. We cannot 
help despising in any calling or in any action the sub- 



356 THE AMERICAN TEACHER — A CODE OF ETHICS 

stitution of brute force for intellectual skill and moral 
influence. 

Other reasons, however, there must be to account for 
the lack of appreciation for the teacher's position. All of 
them are more or less historic in their character. 

The first, perhaps, is that the teacher's calling was until 
a comparatively recent date in the United States, and still 
is, in most European countries, subservient to the profes- 
sion of theology. Not only have the clergy had the ap- 
pointment and supervision of the teacher, but the most 
prominent and highly paid teaching positions have been 
reserved for clergymen. Public schools — tax-supported 
schools — are an institution of very recent growth. At the 
beginning of this century all schools in the United States 
were practically under the control of the clergy. Invari- 
ably clergymen were selected as presidents of colleges. 
Only two years ago a layman for the first time took his seat 
in the presidential chair of Yale, and only a few weeks ago 
did Princeton for the first time come under the direction 
of a president who was not a clergyman. In England, the 
heads of the colleges in Oxford and Cambridge and the 
heads of the great public schools are almost invariably in 
holy orders. The discussion over the education bill that 
has stirred England to its depths is in the last analysis 
nothing more or less than a fight as to whether the clergy 
shall appoint and control the teachers ; and, unfortunately 
for England, the clergy for the time being appear to have 
won. But it can be only for a time. No profession can 
thrive or receive popular recognition and support while it 
remains subservient or subordinate to another profession. 
Schools in which the teachers and their interests are under 



ADDRESS, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, 1902 357 

the control of clergymen can never be the best schools, 
because dependent teachers can never do their best work. 
What position would architects occupy if they were sub- 
servient to engineers, or lawyers if they were placed under 
the control of physicians ? Yet the anomaly is scarcely 
greater than that once presented in this country, and still 
presented in England, of the dependence of the teacher on 
the clergyman. Teachers still suffer in public opinion be- 
cause in the past they were in all things dependent on the 
clergy. 

Only very slowly has the withdrawal of the clergy from 
the active management of public education resulted in 
greater independence for the teacher. He has been 
relieved of the rule of the clergy ; too often he has found 
the thraldom of the politician. To gain place or promo- 
tion he has been obliged to pull political wires, to fawn 
upon men whom he despised, and to seek to obtain by 
influence what it was impossible to accomplish by merit. 
True, it is the tendency of the educational legislation of 
the day to deliver teachers from the serfdom of politics ; 
but still the record of the past causes the world to look 
upon the teacher as the member of a dependent profession. 
The ignominy to which he was in the past subjected clings 
to him even when he has been accorded all his professional 
rights. 

Again, lack of appreciation results from meagerness of 
pay and insecurity of tenure in office. Especially is this 
true in America, where commercialism holds far too wide 
a sway in every walk of life. A man with a very small 
salary will not as a rule wield any great amount of influ- 
ence in the community, and particularly so when it is 



358 THE AMERICAN TEACHER — A CODE OF ETHICS 

known that at the end of a year he may be " kicked out " by 
some one who knows nothing about teaching, in order to 
make room for a successor with no higher qualifications, 
but with a stronger " pull " than himself. That I am not 
.exaggerating will be seen when I state the fact that the 
average monthly salary paid to city elementary and high 
school teachers in the United States is only, according to 
the last Report of the United States Commissioner of 
Education, $47.55 for men and $39.17 for women, while 
one fourth of our teachers change their places every year. 
Reasonable pay and reasonable tenure of office are essen- 
tial to win the respect of the community and to preserve 
that equanimity of mind and that self-respect which are 
necessary to any one who desires to render good service 
and to take advantage of opportunities for self-improve- 
ment. 

But perhaps the strongest reason why the teaching profes- 
sion, notwithstanding its importance to the state, stands so 
low in the public esteem is that teachers themselves have 
too low an estimate of their calling and of the preparation 
it requires. They have not as a rule realized that the aim 
of their work is to bring about the highest development of 
the individual, to secure equal opportunities for all, and to 
perpetuate republican institutions. They have not risen to 
the height of this great argument. Still less have they 
realized that the teacher's calling requires the most thorough 
scholastic and professional preparation. The prevalent 
feeling, to our shame be it spoken, has been that any one 
who knew the rudiments and could keep ahead of his 
pupils was good enough to teach an elementary school. 
Notwithstanding all that is being done by our universities 



ADDRESS, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, 1902 359 

and colleges and normal schools and training schools for 
the professional training of teachers, the vast majority of 
those who are now teaching and of those who are entering 
the profession are still untrained. 

Were the lack of public appreciation and support all 
that results from the causes I have enumerated — from the 
reputation for cruelty to children, from the dependence on 
the clergy or on politicians, from meager pay and uncer- 
tain tenure of office, and from the teacher's own failure 
to realize the importance and dignity of his calling — 
the consequences would be sufficiently serious. But 
these consequences are only a part of the evil. The 
greatest evil is that the teacher's efficiency and his useful- 
ness to the community are impaired. How can a teacher 
introduce his pupils to their spiritual inheritance when he 
does not understand it himself ? How can he lead the 
children committed to his care into habits of reverence, 
self-control, independence, and simple-minded devotion to 
duty, when he himself is dependent on another profession 
or on the favor of politicians ? How can he inspire others 
with high ideals if he himself, in order to secure appoint- 
ment or promotion, must resort to arts that he must despise 
himself for using? How can he do his best work when 
poverty freezes the genial current of his soul, and he does 
not know what will become of himself and those dependent 
on him at the end of the school year ? Arrested efficiency 
is the natural and inevitable consequence to the public 
school if the teacher's professional standing is impaired. 

By some it will be argued that much of the responsibility 
I have attributed to the schools and the teacher belongs to 
the home and the church. The first school was the 



360 THE AMERICAN TEACHER — A CODE OF ETHICS 

family ; and in the well-ordered home the family influence 
is of incalculable educational benefit. In the course of 
time, however, as the pressure of modern life has become 
heavier and social conditions have become more complex, 
an increasingly large part of the educational duties that 
once devolved upon parents has been transferred to the 
school; and, as Dr. Harris has often pointed out, educa- 
tion, as far as it concerns intellectual development, is 
better carried forward in the school than in the home, be- 
cause of the attrition of mind upon mind and because of 
the impetus to intellectual development given by coopera- 
tive work. Indeed, the very existence of public schools is 
public admission that the education of the home will not 
suffice. 

And even in the field of purely ethical instruction the 
church has proved itself deplorably lacking. But a small 
percentage of our children are reached by the Sunday 
schools. Even if these institutions were thoroughly effi- 
cient, I should still say that it is not right, that it is not well 
for this nation, to relegate ethical instruction to one day in 
the week, and to neglect it the other six. For is not a 
body of ethical principles part of our spiritual inheritance, 
quite as much as art, or science, or literature ? And does 
not progress depend at least as much on the development 
of ethical qualities as on hoarding " the long results of 
time " ? But even the most obvious form of ethical in- 
struction — knowledge of the English Bible — is not well 
disseminated by the churches and Sunday schools. The 
accurate, sympathetic knowledge of the Bible that once 
characterized our people is fast disappearing, and now it 
is a rare thing to meet a young American outside the 



ADDRESS, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, 1902 361 

ecclesiastical profession who has even a superficial acquaint- 
ance with that great classic. A distinguished professor 
of English literature at Harvard tells me that he rarely 
finds a Harvard student who has the slightest appreciation 
of the Biblical references in Shakespeare. 

If, then, the public school must be charged, as I believe 
it must, with the ethical as well as' the intellectual training 
of the vast majority of American youth; and if it is 
admitted, as it must be, that the welfare of society and 
the preservation of republican institutions depend in very 
large measure on the intellectual and ethical training given 
in the schools, — surely it follows that it is the business of 
the state to see to it that the teacher's life is lived under 
such conditions that he can render society his most effi- 
cient service. 

These conditions are: (1) adequate preparation rigor- 
ously insisted upon; (2) appointment and promotion by 
some means that shall stimulate the teacher's efforts and 
preserve his self-respect; (3) opportunity for self-improve- 
ment and for the development of originality ; and (4) rea- 
sonable financial support and secure tenure of office for 

the efficient. 

******* 

But, suppose the state does all that I have asked for 
the teacher ; suppose it requires adequate scholastic and pro- 
fessional training, appointment and promotion on merit 
alone, reasonable freedom in teaching, adequate opportu- 
nity for self-improvement, secure tenure of office during 
efficient service, living salaries and support for old age ; 
suppose the state guarantees to the teacher all these things, 
what does the teacher owe to the state in return ? Each 



362 THE AMERICAN TEACHER— A CODE OF ETHICS 

individual teacher owes to the state his greatest energy, 
his most devoted service, his best ability. 

Individual effort, however, is not sufficient. The work 
before the teacher is as wide as humanity. It will never 
be even measurably accomplished unless teachers combine 
their forces and form themselves into societies for the 
accomplishment of common objects. When I speak of 
societies of teachers I do not mean trades-unions or feder- 
ations of labor, because, however worthy and necessary 
these combinations of labor are — and I believe them to 
be very worthy and very necessary — their chief reliance 
for the amelioration of material conditions is the right to 
strike. This is an inalienable right, but it is a right which 
no teacher worthy of the name will ever exercise. The 
teacher's work is too sacred to permit him to leave it for 
his own material advancement. Poverty may come, per- 
secution may come; the true teacher will never desert his 
holy mission to childhood. No possible conditions will 
ever justify a teachers' strike. Yet if they join a trades- 
union they are bound to strike when so ordered. The 
true solidarity of teachers is as far removed from trades- 
unionism as a profession is from a trade. 

I mean by the solidarity of teachers organization to ac- 
complish their high purposes under a code of professional 
ethics that will set a standard of professional honor and 
professional duty which will transcend school board ordi- 
nances and statutory enactments. Such a standard, if 
ever formulated, will be formulated by teachers them- 
selves from a nice sense of honor, from loyalty to a 
noble profession, and from ambition to realize high 
ideals. 



ADDRESS, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, 1902 363 

Time will permit me to indicate only a very few of the 
most salient features of such a code of ethics. 

In the first place, the code will forbid all underbidding, 
all maligning, all pulling down of the reputation of fellow 
teachers, all effort to secure another's place. 

In the second place, the code will forbid the use of 
political, social, or religious influence of any kind to secure 
appointment or promotion. At first sight, this may seem 
a hard saying. As long as municipal government in our 
large cities remains the practical failure which careful 
students of sociology have proclaimed it to be, I suppose 
it is inevitable that politics will exert a baneful influence 
on the public schools ; school boards will reflect more or 
less the political opinions of the appointing power; the less 
worthy among the teachers will endeavor to get ahead of 
their fellows through " pull " ; and even the more worthy 
in moments of weakness will sometimes in self-defense 
resort to the same disgraceful tactics. We may try all 
sorts of expedients through legislation to prevent politics 
entering the administration of the public schools. But 
such expedients, however excellent, will always remain at 
best partial failures until the appeal is made to the pro- 
fessional honor and dignity of the teachers themselves. 
Let it be once understood that it shall be regarded by the 
profession as unprofessional to seek advancement on any 
other ground than merit, and the difficulties of school ad- 
ministration will disappear like the mist before the rising 
sun. It should be as unprofessional for a teacher to use 
" pull " to secure advancement as it is for a physician to 
advertise in the daily press. 

In the third place, the teacher's code of -ethics will en- 



364 THE AMERICAN TEACHER — A CODE OF ETHICS 

join never-ending preparation for work. It is not enough 
that the state or private munificence should provide oppor- 
tunities for self-improvement. It should be part of the 
teacher's inmost nature to embrace them with avidity when 
they are provided and to find them when they are not 
provided. 

Fourth, the teacher's code of ethics will enjoin a firm 
belief in progress, in the possibility of modifying environ- 
ment for the better. All history attests such progress. 
We all believe there has been progress in the past. But 
when we look into the life around us, it is often not so 
easy to believe in progress in the present or the future. 
We see, for instance, that every new discovery and every 
new invention throws wage earners for the time being out 
of employment, and produces acute and widespread suffer- 
ing. We see the great combinations of capital crushing 
out the small dealer and manufacturer. We see labor and 
capital, as in the recent coal strike, engaged in fratricidal 
strife in which ten innocent persons suffer for one who is 
guilty. In the great centers of population and in partially 
deserted rural localities we find suicide, insanity, vaga- 
bondage, drunkenness, and the other various forms of vice 
and crime, increase, as the struggle of life, which nature 
has ordained as the price of progress, increases. " Bar- 
barism is no longer at our frontiers ; it lives side by side 
with us." Often, as we reflect on these things, it is hard 
not to be a pessimist. Often, as we see man's inhumanitv 
to man, as we see the squalor and wretchedness and sin 
that lie all around us, it is difficult to resist the cry, " The 
world is growing worse and worse, and man is moving on 
towards destruction." But the teacher who succumbs to 



ADDRESS, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, 1902 365 

this feeling, all too prevalent in our modern life, has belied 
his profession ; like Peter, he has denied his Lord, but 
without the poor apology of physical terror. The teacher 
is the officer of the state whose duty it is to promote prog- 
ress by enabling each new generation to build higher on 
the foundations laid by its predecessors. As the herald 
of progress, his first duty is to be an honest, thoroughgoing 
believer in what Phillips Brooks called " a great purpose 
underlying the world for good, for human fulfillment, which 
is absolutely certain to fulfill itself somewhere, somehow." 
This is the thought to which Tennyson has given immortal 
utterance in " In Memoriam " : — ■ 

That God which ever lives and loves, 

One God, one law, one element, 
And one far off divine event 

To which the whole creation moves. 

The teacher who does not believe, notwithstanding all 
the hindrances, notwithstanding all the sin and all the 
strife, in the possibility of elevating the human race men- 
tally, morally, and physically, the teacher who cannot see 
in his work, however humble, something that brings a 
shade nearer that " one far off divine event to which the 
whole creation moves," has no part or lot in the ethics of 
the teaching profession. 

Fifth, the commandment to believe in progress carries with 
it the duty to help all who need help, and particularly 
children. Neither talents, nor learning, nor accomplish- 
ments will avail the teacher much unless they are devoted to 
the service of mankind. He should feel, as Felix Adler has 
said, that he is building a temple in which the lives of the 
pupils he trains shall be the building stones. 



366 THE AMERICAN TEACHER — A CODE OF ETHICS 

Sixth, and lastly, the teacher's code of ethics will enjoin 
him to be humane and gentle toward all children. A 
harsh word, a cruel look, may wound the child spirit to the 
death ; all your powers of kindness and magnetism are 
required to call it into action. The ox may crush the lily 
into the dirt ; it needs the glories of the sun of heaven to coax 
it into life. As a great teacher once said : " Ah, believe me, 
fellow teachers, where two or three children are met to- 
gether, unless He who is the Spirit of Gentleness be in 
the midst of them, then our Latin is but sounding brass 
and our Greek a tinkling cymbal." 

These, then, are the duties which, whether or not the 
state provides the conditions that shall best promote pro- 
fessional efficiency, the teacher owes to the state : profes- 
sional courtesy to one another, a firm belief in progress 
and a constant striving toward helpfulness, never-ending 
preparation for life work, and love and gentleness toward 
all children. 



XXXII 

EDUCATION FOR EFFICIENCY 

{President's Address delivered before the National Educational Association at 
Ocean Grove, N. J., July, igoj) 

THE National Educational Association meets in its 
forty-fourth annual convention at the moment when 
Japan has given the world another great object lesson in 
the value of education. Ever since Napoleon's retreat 
from Moscow, the world has stood in awe of that massive and 
mysterious power which we call Russia. In that fateful 
campaign it was not the skill of the Russian commanders 
or the bravery of the Russian soldiers that wrought the 
catastrophe ; it was the snowflakes — the arrows from the 
quiver of God — that overwhelmed the might of the in- 
vader. Ever since, Russia has gloried in a victory that 
was not of her own achieving. The world accepted her 
at her own valuation, and stood in awe. Wrapt in the 
glamour of an unearned renown, Russia pursued her aggres- 
sions practically unopposed, until her empire stretched 
from the Baltic Sea to the Pacific Ocean. There her 
career of conquest has ended. There, once again, has 
broken out the irrepressible conflict between ignorance 
and enlightenment. On the one side stands a people, 
almost countless in number and rich beyond knowledge in 
all natural wealth, but ignorant, devoid of initiative, and 
alienated from their rulers by despotism and cruelty. On 

367 



368 EDUCATION FOR EFFICIENCY 

the other side stand the Japanese — a people limited in 
numbers and confined in territory, but born again through 
the diffusion of knowledge and through the universal train- 
ing for efficiency which has made their inherited patriotism 
invincible. 

Japan has but repeated at Port Arthur and at Mukden 
and on the Japan Sea the lesson of history — the lesson of 
Marathon, of Zama, of the Invincible Armada, of the 
Heights of Abraham, of Waterloo, and of Sedan ; the 
lesson that the race which gives its children the most 
effective training for life sooner or later becomes a domi- 
nant race. Borrowing eagerly from Western civilizations, 
Japan has adopted for her own whatever school exercise or 
method of teaching gives promise of training for efficiency. 
Nobly has she repaid her debt to Europe and America. 
She has demonstrated to the world that the training of 
the young to skill of hand, to accuracy of vision, to high 
physical development, to scientific knowledge, to accurate 
reasoning, and to practical patriotism — for these are the 
staples of Japanese education — is the best and cheapest 
defense of nations. 

Such are the lessons of war. The history of peaceful 
industrial effort tells the same story. No nation is truly 
prosperous until every man has become, not merely a con- 
sumer, but a producer. As Emerson most truly said : — 

A man fails to make his place good in the world unless he not only pays 
his debt, but also adds something to the common wealth. Efficient universal 
education, that makes men producers as well as consumers, is the surest 
guarantee of progress in the arts of peace — is the mother of national pros- 
perity. 

" But," exclaims an objector, "this is gross mate- 
rialism." Not so. The history of the world shows that a 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 369 

nation improves morally and intellectually only as its phys- 
ical condition is strengthened. The futility of religious 
missionary effort, when unaccompanied by physical better- 
ment, is of itself sufficient to prove the thesis. Better 
shelter, better food, better clothing, are the necessary an- 
tecedents and accompaniments of higher thinking, greater 
self-respect, and more resolute independence. 

True, material prosperity too often brings with it a train 
of evils all its own ; sensual indulgence or slothful ease, 
it may be ; or the grasping at monopoly and " man's in- 
humanity to man " ; or a feverish pursuit of material 
things, to the neglect of the spiritual. True, enormous 
wealth is often accompanied, particularly in crowded cen- 
ters of population, by extreme poverty. These, however, 
are but temporary reversions to barbarism — the price we 
must pay for progress. The best corrective of the evils 
generated by the accumulation of wealth is not antitrust 
laws or other repressive legislation, but a system of schools 
which provides a training for all that is equal to the best 
which money can buy ; which discovers and reveals genius 
born in low estate, and enables it to fructify for the common 
good ; and which guarantees to every child the full 
development of all his powers. The trained man will 
demand, and will, in the long run, receive, his due share. 
Education is a chief cause of wealth and the most certain 
corrective of its abuse. In a community in which every 
man had been trained to his highest efficiency, monopoly 
and poverty would be alike impossible. 

In the light of these historic truths, you will permit me, 
as a prelude to the addresses which are to be delivered before 
the meetings, general and departmental, of this convention, 



370 EDUCATION FOR EFFICIENCY 

to state very briefly — I do not venture to say, discuss — 
a few of the burning educational questions of the day. 

The first of these questions is : What does " education 
for efficiency " mean ? It does not mean that every man 
should be trained to be a soldier. True, the man who 
is well trained for the duties of peace is, in these days of 
scientific instruments of destruction, well prepared for war ; 
but military prowess can never become the ideal of educa- 
tion among a great industrial people. It does not mean 
merely that each citizen should be able to read the news- 
papers and magazines, so that he may be familiar with politi- 
cal discussions, and able to make an intelligent choice 
between candidates and policies. The imparting of such 
knowledge to each individual is essential in a democratic na- 
tion, but it falls far short of the education needed to secure 
the highest efficiency of each unit of society. Still less does 
it mean that wretched travesty of education which would 
confine the work of the public schools to those exercises in 
reading, writing, and ciphering which will enable a boy or 
a girl, at the age of fourteen or earlier, to earn starvation 
wages in a store or factory. Education for efficiency 
means all of these things; but it means much more. It 
means the development of each citizen, first as an individ- 
ual, and second as a member of society. It means bodies 
kept fit for service by appropriate exercise. It means that 
each student shall be taught to use his hands deftly, to 
observe accurately, to reason justly, to express himself 
clearly. It means that he shall learn " to live cleanly, 
happily, and helpfully, with those around him " ; that he 
shall learn to cooperate with his fellows for far-reaching 
and far-distant ends ; that he shall learn the everlasting 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 371 

truth of the words uttered nearly two thousand years ago : 
" No man liveth to himself," and, " Bear ye one another's 
burdens." Such, I take it, is the goal of American educa- 
tion. 

If this ideal of developing the highest individual and 
social efficiency of each citizen is the goal of American 
education, obviously the curriculum of our schools becomes 
an object of extreme solicitude. Particularly is this the 
case with the elementary schools, for these contain over 
ninety per cent of the children under instruction. During 
the last quarter of a century a great movement for the reform 
of the elementary curriculum has been gathering strength. 
The most prominent characteristics of this movement would 
seem to have been the development of the imagination and 
the higher emotions through literature and art and music ; 
the training of the body and the executive powers of the 
mind through physical training, play, and manual training ; 
and the introduction of the child to the sources of material 
wealth through the direct study of nature and of processes 
of manufacture. At first the movement seems to have 
been founded on a psychological basis. To-day the tend- 
ency is to seek a sociological foundation — to adjust the 
child to his environment of man and of nature. 

At various times during the past ten or fifteen years, and 
particularly during the past year, reactionary voices have 
been loudly raised against the new education, and in favor 
of the old. Such were to be expected. Reactions follow 
inevitably in the wake of every reform, political and social. 
Analysis will show that the reactionary tendencies in edu- 
cation arise from three chief sources : — 

1. The demagogic contentions of selfish politicians, who 



372 EDUCATION FOR EFFICIENCY 

see that it costs more money to teach the new subjects of 
the curriculum than the old, and that thus a large propor- 
tion of the public revenue is diverted from the field of 
political spoils. These are the men who have invented the 
term "fads and frills" to designate art, manual training, 
music, and nature study. It must be theirs to learn that 
it will require something more than a stupid alliteration to 
stem the tide of those irresistible forces that are making 
the modern school the faithful counterpart of the modern 
world and an adequate preparation for its activities. The 
saving common sense of the common people, when delib- 
erately appealed to, will always come to the rescue of the 
schools. 

2. The reactionary tendency is due in part to an 
extremely conservative element that still exists among the 
teaching force. For the most part, teachers who are still 
extremely conservative were themselves brought up chiefly 
on the dry husks of a formal curriculum. They find it 
difficult to learn and to teach the new subjects. They 
dislike to be bothered by the assistance of special teachers. 
Accustomed to mass work both in learning and in teaching, 
they regret the introduction into the schoolroom of arts 
which demand attention to individual pupils. 

3. The reactionary tendency has its roots even among 
the more progressive teachers in a vague feeling of disap- 
pointment and regret that manual training, correlation, and 
nature study have probably not accomplished all that their 
enthusiastic advocates promised ten to twenty years ago. 

The feeling of disappointment, we might say even of 
discontent, among the more thoughtful and progressive 
teachers, is what might have been anticipated. In the first 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 373 

place, public education has become a much more difficult 
thing than it was half a century ago. It has become more 
difficult for two reasons : — 

1. Because of the constantly increasing migration of 
population from the country to the cities. Children re- 
moved from rustic to urban life lose that most valuable 
education which comes from the work and the associations 
of the farmyard and the fields. 

2. Because of the enormous increase in immigration 
from abroad, and particularly because the character of the 
immigration has changed. Up to the middle of the last 
century the majority of our immigrants were of kindred 
blood with the American people, and a large proportion 
spoke our language. Gradually, however, the tide of im- 
migration, while swelling until it has now reached the 
enormous total of one million a year, has shifted its chief 
sources from the shores of the North and the Baltic seas 
to the shores of the Mediterranean. The peoples of south- 
ern Europe, illiterate, accustomed to tyranny, without indi- 
vidual initiative, and habituated to a low standard of living, 
huddle themselves together in our large cities and factory 
towns under conditions inimical alike to morals, to physi- 
cal well-being, and to intellectual advancement. Teachers 
have a good right to complain that municipal authorities, 
in permitting the overcrowding of immigrants in unsani- 
tary quarters, have aided the establishment of the most 
serious obstacle yet discovered to the upward progress of 
public education. 

In the second place, the feeling of disappointment with 
the results of the newer studies arises from the fact that 
these studies were introduced before the teachers were 



374 EDUCATION FOR EFFICIENCY 

prepared to teach them ; that for too long they were con- 
cerned chiefly with uninteresting formal processes rather 
than with interesting results ; that they were not related to 
real needs of school and home, and were not properly co- 
ordinated with other phases of the curriculum. Much yet 
remains to be done to assimilate the environment of the 
school to the environment of the world. 

And yet, while we may feel discontented with the situ- 
ation, and regret the increased difficulties of our work, there 
is no reason for discouragement. I have no hesitation in 
saying that in general intelligence, in all-round efficiency, 
in power of initiative, the pupils whom I now see are 
superior to those of a quarter of a century ago. If the 
obstacles before us are more formidable, if the problems 
are more complicated than those presented to our prede- 
cessors, the teachers of America are better organized and 
better equipped to overcome the obstacles and to solve the 
problems. He who has sailed in a modern steamship 
through an ocean storm has seen the mighty vessel cleave 
the billows and scarcely slacken her speed in the teeth of a 
hurricane. Down in the depths of the ship men are piling 
coal on the furnaces and releasing a force — the imprisoned 
sun power of uncounted ages — that baffles the waves and 
defies the whirlwind. And so it is with our ship of state. 
Come what storms of ignorance or wickedness there may, 
teachers are supplying the fuel of knowledge and releasing 
the force of intelligence that will hold our nation in the 
straight course of progress. 

And yet, the teachers of America are still far from sat- 
isfied with their achievements. They are dissatisfied with 
the elementary curriculum, because it seems crowded with 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 375 

the new studies that have been added without diminishing 
the number of the old. They are dissatisfied with the 
high school curriculum, because the old-style language, 
mathematics, and science course, however suitable it may 
be for admission to college, does not precisely meet the 
needs of boys and girls who are going directly into life. 
They are dissatisfied with the specialized high school, be- 
cause it seems lacking in some of those attributes of culture 
in which the old-time school was strong. And they are 
dissatisfied with the college course, because the elective 
system, which has taken the place of the old prescribed 
course, does not seem to give a strong, intellectual fiber to 
the weaker students who, too often, follow the path of least 
resistance. And they are dissatisfied because there is less 
intelligence, less efficiency, and less helpfulness in the 
world than the world needs. So far from feeling concerned 
at this widespread discontent, we should rejoice that it ex- 
ists. There is nothing so blighting to educational enthu- 
siasm as smug satisfaction with what is or what has been ; 
there is nothing so stimulating to educational effort as a 
realizing sense of present imperfections and of higher 
possibilities. 

As to the curriculum of the higher schools and colleges, 
the problem is really, not what studies shall be inserted and 
what omitted, but how shall we make it possible for the 
student to get that culture, efficiency, and power out of his 
studies which his development requires. This is really a 
question for psychology to answer. Well may we ask of our 
universities, with their psychological laboratories and their 
sensitive apparatus for measuring mental reactions : Will 
psychology ever accomplish what phrenology once promised, 



376 EDUCATION FOR EFFICIENCY 

but has never performed - — the determination of a young 
student's capabilities and of the line of work he ought to 
pursue ? 

As to the elementary curriculum, surely we shall not go 
far wrong if we apply to each study, and even to each de- 
tail of each study, these four questions : — 

1. Is this study or this exercise well within the compre- 
hension of the child ? 

2. Does it help to adjust him to the material and the 
spiritual environment of the age and of the community in 
which he lives ? 

3. Does it combine with the other studies of the curric- 
ulum to render him more efficient in conquering nature 
and in getting along with his fellows, and thus to realize 
ideals that transcend environment ? 

4. Does it accomplish these objects better than any other 
study that might be selected for these purposes ? 

If these questions are answered in the affirmative, we 
may reasonably conclude that the study or the exercise in 
question is an important element in education for efficiency. 
Examined from the viewpoint established by these questions, 
every study will assume an aspect very different from that 
which it bears when taught without a well-defined object. 
Take drawing, for example. Drawing may be so taught 
as not only to lay bare to seeing eyes new worlds of beauty, 
but to lead to that reverent appreciation of nature, and the 
reapplication of her lessons to daily industrial art, which is 
the way, as Ruskin has said, in which the soul can most 
truly and wholesomely develop essential religion. 

Again, take the teaching of agriculture. While our soil 
seemed inexhaustible in fertility as in extent, the need of 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 377 

such teaching was not felt. Now, however, we are obliged 
to have recourse to lands that produce only under irrigation. 
The rural schools have added to our difficulties by teaching 
their pupils only what seemed most necessary for success 
when they should move to the city. The farms of New 
England are, in large measure, deserted or are passing into 
alien hands. To retain the country boy on the land, and to 
keep our soil from exhaustion, it is high time that all our rural 
schools turned their attention, as some of them have done, 
to scientific agriculture. There is no study of greater 
importance; there is none more entertaining. If every 
country boy could become, according to his ability, a Bur- 
bank, increasing the yield of the fruit tree, the grain field, 
and the cotton plantation, producing food and clothing 
where before there was only waste, what riches would be 
added to our country, what happiness would be infused into 
life ! To obtain one plant that will metamorphose the field 
or the garden, ten thousand plants must be grown and de- 
stroyed. To find one Burbank, ten thousand boys must be 
trained ; but, unlike the plants, all the boys will have been 
benefited. The gain to the nation would be incalculable. 
Scientific agriculture, practically taught, is as necessary 
for the rural school as is manual training for the city 
school. 

Nor are our people going to rest satisfied with mere 
manual training. The Moseley commissioners pointed out 
that the great defect in American education is the absence 
of trade schools. Trade schools will inevitably come. 
The sooner, the better. They are demanded for individual 
and social efficiency. 

It is not in secondary schools alone, however, that 



378 EDUCATION FOR EFFICIENCY 

efficiency demands highly differentiated types of schools. 
It is absurd to place the boy or girl, ten or twelve years of 
age, just landed from Italy, who cannot read a word in his 
own language or speak a word of English, in the same 
class with American boys and girls five or six years old. 
For a time, at least, the foreigners require to be segregated 
and to receive special treatment. Again, the studies that 
appeal to the normal boy only disgust the confirmed truant 
or the embryo criminal. Yet again, the mentally defective, 
the crippled, and the physically weak children require spe- 
cial treatment. Unless all indications fail, the demand 
for education for efficiency will lead in all our large cities 
to the organization of many widely differentiated types of 
elementary school. 

The problem of the curriculum, important as it is, is less 
important than the problem of the teacher. The born 
teacher — that is, the man or woman who has a genius for 
teaching — will teach well, in spite of any curriculum, 
however bad. Unfortunately, genius is as rare in the pro- 
fession of teaching as it is in law, or medicine, or any other 
profession. The great majority of us, as it needs must be, 
are very commonplace persons, who are seeking for light 
and doing the best we can. Hence, the supreme impor- 
tance of training. And yet there is no part of our work to 
which so little thought and investigation have been given. 
Normal schools in this country are still very young — only 
a little over half a century old. The first normal schools 
were high schools with a little pedagogy thrown in. The 
majority of them remain the same to this day. There is a 
strong movement, however, toward purely professional 
schools to which no student who has not had a reasonably 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 379 

liberal education is admitted, and in which he shall devote 
his entire time to learning how to teach — how to observe, 
understand, and exercise children both mentally and phys- 
ically. Welcome and necessary as this movement is, if all 
teachers are to train for efficiency, we are still far from 
precise scientific notions as to the best methods of training 
teachers. I commend this subject to the National Council 
as one of the next investigations it should undertake. 

To secure training for efficiency, the conditions of teach- 
ing must be such that each teacher shall be able to do his 
best work. By common consent, one of these conditions 
is that teachers shall not be subjected to the ignominy of 
seeking political or other influence, or cringing for the 
favor of any man, in order to secure appointment or pro- 
motion. During the past year two events have occurred 
which seem to be full of promise for the establishment of 
this condition. The public school teachers of Philadelphia 
have been freed from the bondage toward politicians in 
which they were held for well-nigh a century ; and the one- 
man power, beneficent as such a system proved under a 
Draper and a Jones in Cleveland, has been supplanted by 
an apparently more rational system. Independence of 
thought and freedom of initiative are necessary to the 
teachers of a nation whose stability and welfare as a repub- 
lic depend upon the independence, the intelligence, and the 
free initiative of its citizens. Independence of thought 
and freedom of initiative may be throttled by bad laws, but 
under the best laws they will be maintained only by the 
teachers themselves. By making it unprofessional to seek 
appointment or promotion through social, religious, or 
political influence, the teachers of this country have it in 



380 EDUCATION FOR EFFICIENCY 

their power to establish one of the most essential conditions 
of education for efficiency. 

Under the conditions that confront us, particularly in the 
large cities, with the rapid increase and constant migration 
of our home population, with the influx of vast hordes of 
people from abroad, alien in language, alien in modes of 
thought, and alien in tradition, the character of our elemen- 
tary work is undergoing a profound transformation. We 
are beginning to see that every school should be a model 
of good housekeeping and a model of good government 
through cooperative management. What more may the 
schools do ? They can provide knowledge and intellectual 
entertainment for adults as well as for children. They can 
keep their doors open summer as well as winter, evening 
as well as morning. They can make all welcome for read- 
ing, for instruction, for social intercourse, and for recrea- 
tion. But I for one believe they may do still more. When 
I look upon the anaemic faces and undeveloped bodies that 
mark so many of the children of the tenements ; when I 
read of the terrible ravages of tuberculosis in the same 
quarters, I cannot but think that the city should provide 
wholesome food for children at the lowest possible cost in 
public school kitchens. To lay the legal burden of learn- 
ing upon children whose blood is impoverished and whose 
digestion is impaired by insufficient or unwholesome feeding 
is not in accord with the boasted altruism of an advanced 
civilization or with the divine command, " Feed the 
hungry." Is this not also a subject for investigation by 
our National Council ? 

And should it some day come to pass that men will look 
upon corruption in public and corporate life, such as of 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1905 381 

late we have seen exposed in New York, Philadelphia, and 
St. Louis, with the same loathing with which they regard 
crime in private life, it will be when the schools are in ear- 
nest about teaching our young people the fundamental 
laws of ethics, that — 

The ten commandments will not budge, 
And stealing still continues stealing. 

But economic perils and racial differences are the 
teacher's opportunity. Here in this country are gathered 
the sons and the daughters of all nations. Ours is the 
task, not merely of teaching them our language and respect 
for our laws, but of imbuing them with the spirit of self- 
direction, our precious inheritance from the Puritans ; the 
spirit of initiative, which comes to us from the pioneers 
who subdued a continent to the uses of mankind ; : and 
the spirit of cooperation which is symbolized by, and 
embodied in, the everlasting union of sovereign states to 
promote the common weal. And as, in my own city, I see 
the eagerness of foreigners to learn, and the skill and devo- 
tion of our teachers, I cannot but think that we are over- 
coming our almost insurmountable difficulties. 

There is, perhaps, no more striking moment in all his- 
tory than that at which the apostle Paul, standing on Mars 
Hill and pointing to the blue ^Egean, the center of the 
then known world, proclaimed the new but eternal doctrine, 
" God hath made of one every nation of men for to dwell 
on all the face of the earth." Standing here, as we do, on 
the border of the Atlantic Ocean, and beholding, on the 
one side, the dove of peace alighting from the hand of our 
President on the fields of carnage in the Far Hast, and, on 

1 Miinsterberg, "The Americans," Chaps. I and II. 



382 EDUCATION FOR EFFICIENCY 

the other side, the homes of people of all nationalities stretch- 
ing from the Atlantic to the isles of the Pacific, under the 
protection of the American flag, may we not realize that we, 
as teachers, have a great part to perform in bringing a 
vast company to an understanding of the sublime truth 
that God has made all men one to dwell on the face of the 
earth ; that their mission is not to defraud and to slay, but 
each to do his best for himself and to help his fellows ? 



XXXIII 

THE ECONOMICAL USE OF SCHOOL 
BUILDINGS 

{A paper read before the National Council of Education, July, iQio) 

THAT a public school building may be used economi- 
cally, it ought to be used all the time — summer and 
winter, morning, afternoon, and evening — and it ought 
to be used for the greatest benefit to the greatest number 
of people. Otherwise a large part of the people's invest- 
ment in the building is wasted. To use a school building 
only from nine to three, five days in the week, nine months 
in the year — in other words, to allow it to remain unused 
more than one half the working year — is not only to 
waste the people's money, but to deprive of the benefits 
of its use many thousands of persons of all ages who 
might otherwise take advantage of them. 

It is evident, however, that a building which consists of 
a cellar, corridors, and rooms furnished with children's 
seats and desks fastened to the floor may be conveniently 
used for but one purpose — the conduct of school recita- 
tions. If a school building is to be used for social and 
recreative purposes, even if it is to be used economically 
for the purposes of a modern school, it should be con- 
structed and furnished very differently from the prevail- 
ing type of schoolhouse. 

383 



384 ECONOMICAL USE OF SCHOOL BUILDINGS 

In all of this discussion two considerations are, I think, 
self-evident : — 

1. The schoolhouse is intended primarily for children. If, therefore, 
there comes a conflict between the interests of children and the interests of 
adults in planning the building, the interests of the children must prevail. 

2. Children are entitled to time and opportunity for play — the natural 
means of development for the young of the human species, as it is for the 
young of all animals. 

My first proposition, then, is that every schoolhouse 
should have abundant play space. I need not dwell on 
the importance of providing large out-of-door playgrounds. 
These are of the greatest service when they are fully 
equipped and rightly used. When, however, they are 
laid out in grass and flowers, as is the case in many of our 
smaller cities and villages, they are more ornamental than 
useful. Happily, school gardening is coming into vogue 
and is rapidly converting sham playgrounds into real play- 
grounds. But the outdoor playground, no matter how it 
may be used, is not sufficient. It is not used on exces- 
sively hot days. It is not used on very cold days. It is 
not used at night. It is not used when it rains or when it 
snows. Under the best conditions, it is used less than one 
half the days of the school year. By the erection of suit- 
able shelters it might be used much more than it is. In 
any case, however, it should be supplemented by a large 
indoor or covered playground. In New York, where the 
cost of sites is so high as to prohibit the purchase of much 
more land than that on which the building stands, we utilize 
practically the whole of the ground floor as an indoor 
playground. This large room is kept heated in winter to 
about fifty degrees. It has large folding doors and abun- 
dant window space, so that there may always be a free cir- 



NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION, 1910 385 

culation of air. Its walls, floor, and ceiling are given a 
light and cheerful finish, so that it may not offend the 
aesthetic feelings. Permanent benches are constructed 
round the walls, so that tired children may have somewhere 
to rest. It is equipped with the usual gymnasium outfit 
— wands, clubs, dumb bells, jumping mats, bars, and horses. 
A small movable platform for the use of teachers or 
speakers adds greatly to the number of uses to which the 
room may be put. By all means let us have outdoor 
playgrounds if we can, but whether we can or not, every 
school should be provided with an indoor playground. Its 
advantages are : — 

(a) It can be used in all weathers, at all seasons of the year, at all hours 
of the day or evening. 

{&) Where a school is so crowded that, as is often the case in New York, 
two classes must occupy the same room at different hours, one class may be 
having, in the covered playground, games or folk dancing, or calisthenics, 
while the other class is reciting. 

(c) The covered playground solves the problem of a place in which to 
provide recreative space for young working people on winter evenings. It 
may be made so attractive as to draw girls from dance halls and young men 
from saloons. 

In New York in the densely populated parts, where an 
outdoor playground is impossible on account of the cost, we 
have solved the problem by constructing playgrounds on 
the roof. Such roof playgrounds are now rendered feasible 
through modern methods of fireproof construction. The 
floor of the playground, which is also the roof of the 
building, is constructed of vitrified tile or brick. Abundant 
entrances and exits, toilet facilities, and drinking water are 
provided. A parapet wall three or four feet high surrounds 
the roof, while the top and sides are inclosed by a wire 



386 ECONOMICAL USE OF SCHOOL BUILDINGS 

netting stretched over steel trusses, to prevent the throw- 
ing of injurious missiles into the surrounding streets. 
Such a playground on the roof may be used not only for 
ordinary play purposes, but for band concerts and dancing 
on summer nights. 

A schoolhouse should be equipped not only with play- 
grounds, but with an assembly room that will accommodate 
at least one third of the school at one time, and with shops 
and cooking rooms for manual training in the case of the 
older children. 

In order that an assembly room may be used, as it 
should be, for lectures, concerts, and other entertainments, 
as well as for ordinary school purposes, it should be placed 
not higher than the first classroom floor and may be placed, 
if the configuration of the ground permits, below the level 
of the street, its roof constructed largely of glass, forming 
the floor of an interior court. Its seats should be such 
that it may be used not only by the smaller children, but by 
adults. Benches should be discarded, because they are 
uncomfortable and do not conform to the now universally 
accepted plan of radial aisles. Proper provision should 
also be made for the use of a stereopticon and screen. 
Electrical conduits and wiring should be brought to a 
central point at the rear of the room, never to the center, 
so as to avoid annoyance to the audience by the operation 
of the lantern. The screen, which when hung from the 
ceiling generally presents an untidy appearance, should be 
placed in a pocket in the floor of the platform, from which 
it may be raised by means of a pulley, and to which it may 
be restored when not in use. The stage itself should be 
furnished with side entrances, curtains at the front, and 



NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION, 1910 387 

footlights, to permit of dramatic performances. Every 
schoolhouse should be a children's theater. 

Even the classroom should be planned with a view to 
its use for other than strictly school purposes. Much dif- 
ference of opinion continues to exist regarding the size of 
classrooms. Doubtless a very large classroom — one, say, 
twenty-six by thirty -two feet — serves social purposes better 
than a smaller room. In spite of this fact, however, I must 
give my allegiance to the smaller room, say the German 
standard of twenty-two by thirty feet. My reasons are : — ■ 

(a) The smaller room conserves both teachers' and pupils' energy, be- 
cause less effort is required in the use of the voice in a room of nine thousand 
cubic feet capacity than in one of twelve thousand cubic feet. 

(<5) The smaller room admits of perfect lighting while using only one side 
of the room for windows, because the innermost row of desks is brought well 
within the limit of proper lighting, which is conceded to be one and one half 
the height of the top of the windows from the floor. In the larger room 
windows are generally formed in the side and rear — an arrangement which 
compels the teacher to face the light. 

The important consideration, however, to render a class- 
room appropriate for social as well as school purposes, is 
not the size of the room so much as its furniture. As 
classrooms are now furnished with seats and desks fastened 
to the floor, they serve only the school purposes of reading, 
writing, and listening. The seats are too small for adults. 
The desks are not suitable for drawing or manual training. 
There is no reform in school construction more needed to- 
day than the destruction of the fixed seat and desk and the 
substitution of movable tables and chairs. The advantages 
of the latter are these : — 

(a) Movable furniture is more wholesome, because it permits the removal 
of all dirt and dust from the floor. 



388 ECONOMICAL USE OF SCHOOL BUILDINGS 

(b) It can be better arranged by the teacher either for class exercises or 
for group exercises. 

(c) The tables serve better for manual training and drawing exercises. 
(</) By proper disposition of the furniture every classroom may become at 

will a recitation room, a game room, a dancing floor, a gymnasium. 

(e) Each room may be freely used in the afternoon or evening for club or 
other social purposes. 

There is only one other reform in school construction 
comparable in utility with the substitution of movable for 
fixed furniture, and that is the invention of a system of ar- 
tificial ventilation that will supply thirty cubic feet of fresh 
air per pupil per minute, and that will work in all weathers, 
in all rooms, and whether the windows are open or closed. 

Recent medical research and experimentation show that 
breathing pure air, night and day, is the most potent means 
of curing and preventing tuberculosis — the plague of 
modern civilization. The schools have properly been called 
upon to do their part in this all-important work. Started 
in Germany, the open-air class has also been tried with 
beneficial results in several European countries. The first 
class of the kind in America was established by the New 
York Board of Education in 1904 on the seashore at Coney 
Island, in connection with a charitable institution. For 
this purpose the roofs of buildings, schoolyards, meadows, 
parks, and, as in New York, old ferryboats, have been 
utilized. It begins to be evident, however, that, sooner or 
later, the demand for open-air classes will become so great 
that it will be necessary to construct our school buildings in 
such a manner that each room shall have at least one of 
the inclosing sides arranged to admit a practically unim- 
peded circulation of air. The most satisfactory arrange- 
ment thus far devised is the use of glass set in comparatively 



NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION, 1910 389 

small frames, supported on pivots and operated by levers 
and gears, so that it may be placed at will in nearly a 
horizontal position, so that 95 per cent of the lighting will 
also be air-admitting surface. A room with windows of 
this kind has been found in New York to be practically an 
open-air room. There can be no more economical use of a 
school building than to use it for restoring strength to the 
weak and health to the sick. 

Suppose, then, we have a building constructed for the 
largest possible number of uses — a building with an assem- 
bly room, large indoor playgrounds, gymnasium, work- 
shops, cooking rooms, and with each classroom furnished 
with movable furniture — what are the activities, other 
than regular day school, that may profitably be undertaken ? 

First, there are evening schools. Evening schools, how- 
ever, have not been economically managed. The attendance 
is almost invariably small — from 20 to 40 per cent of the 
enrollment The suggestion has been made — and I un- 
derstand the experiment has been successfully tried — that 
a small deposit of money should be required from each stu- 
dent. I am inclined to think, however, that at least in the 
case of one large class of evening school students — those 
who leave school at fourteen without having completed the 
elementary school course — the evening school from eight 
to ten o'clock is not an efficient institution. No boy of 
these tender years should be expected, after working all 
day, to give up his evenings to study. In my judgment, 
the state should retain its hold on each child until he com- 
pletes at least the eight years' elementary course. If an 
employer takes into his service the child who leaves school 
with no proper equipment for fighting the battle of life in 



390 ECONOMICAL USE OF SCHOOL BUILDINGS 

these days of dire competition, the state should see to it 
that the time required for giving him a moiety of that 
equipment should be taken, not out of the child's hours for 
rest and recreation, but out of the employer's hours for 
labor. I recommend, therefore, that classes be established 
from 7 to 9 a.m. and from 4 to 8 p.m. for working 
boys and girls who did not complete the eight years' ele- 
mentary school course before going to work, and that our 
compulsory education laws be so amended as to make such 
a rule effective. 

Another large class of evening school students consists 
of adult foreigners who come to learn the English language. 
In New York City the foreign classes — running from the 
middle of October until the middle of April — have always 
been successful. This year, however, we are trying an ex- 
periment which bids fair to surpass all of our previous efforts 
along this line. During the summer months we have 
opened an evening school for foreigners. The attendance 
and enthusiasm of the students surpass all our anticipations. 
Should the attendance keep up during July and August, it 
is safe to say that this summer evening school is only the 
precursor of a great system of such schools — another 
means of economically using school buildings for the bene- 
fit of the largest possible number of persons. 

In evening lectures to the people the school assembly 
room, or, in default of an assembly room, the large indoor 
playground, may be utilized from October until May. 
From May until cool weather comes again, no one who is 
not a teacher will endure a lecture. The experience of our 
New York lecture bureau is that the best lectures and 
lecturers are none too good for the plain working people 



NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION, 1910 391 

who frequent our assembly rooms ; and that, while the lec- 
ture illustrated by the stereopticon or relieved by music is 
still the most popular, the scientific, the literary, and the 
historical lectures given in courses in which the hearer 
may question the lecturer and which are accompanied by 
lists of books for reading, are attracting increasingly large 
audiences of intelligent students. Last season public lec- 
tures in the New York schools were delivered by six hun- 
dred and forty-one lecturers in one hundred and sixty-nine 
centers, to audiences aggregating 1,213,116 people. 

Akin to the use of the assembly room or covered play- 
ground for lectures is their use for special celebrations. 
On February 12, 1909, the one hundredth anniversary of 
the birth of Abraham Lincoln was celebrated in New York, 
among other ways, by the delivery of forty-six lectures on 
Lincoln by prominent citizens in forty-six school build- 
ings to audiences aggregating 65,249 people. On Septem- 
ber 29, 1909, the three hundredth anniversary of the dis- 
covery of the Hudson River by Henry Hudson, and the 
one hundredth anniversary of the successful application of 
steam to navigation by Robert Fulton, were celebrated by 
the delivery of seventy-six addresses by members of the 
teaching and supervising staff in seventy-six school build- 
ings, to audiences aggregating 71,055 people. 

There is a large class of young working people who do 
not attend evening school, and who, if some other provi- 
sion is not made for them, drift into the saloons, dance 
halls, and moving picture shows. For these we have 
opened in New York evening recreation centers. For 
these activities we utilize chiefly the indoor playgrounds, 
but also many classrooms. The playground is divided 



392 ECONOMICAL USE OF SCHOOL BUILDINGS 

into two parts by folding doors. One part is used for 
quiet games and reading. The other is used for gym- 
nastics in the case of boys, and folk dancing in the case 
of girls. - Classrooms are assigned to debating, literary, 
and athletic clubs, whose members not only acquire in- 
formation but learn how to speak in public and learn the 
necessity for order, decorum, and dignity in their deliber- 
ations. A recent addition to this activity is the establish- 
ment of study-rooms for children who have no proper 
place to study their lessons at home. A single story will 
suffice to show their usefulness. About a year ago a little 
girl was found to be extremely slow and backward and 
apparently quite unable to keep up with her grade in 
which she had already spent more than twice the allotted 
time. Investigation showed that she was a member of 
a large family in which English was not the family lan- 
guage and which occupied two rooms in a tenement house. 
For the poor child, reading and speaking English at home 
were out of the question. A kindly friend led her to the 
study-room in the neighboring recreation center. There 
a skillful teacher showed her how to study and helped her 
over her difficulties. On the next promotion day she was 
promoted, and by last February she had progressed so 
rapidly that she was advanced two grades. 

Another innovation in our evening recreation centers is 
the permission given to the young women in the girls' 
centers to invite their young men friends to a dance one 
evening each week. This experiment, conducted under 
the watchful eyes of skilled supervisors, has been com- 
pletely successful. Only by setting up legitimate attrac- 
tions in our school buildings for the leisure hours of our 



NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION, 1910 393 

young working people can we hope to keep them away 
from those city pleasures, run for profit, that lure our boys 
and girls to the very mouth of hell. 

How shall we utilize our school buildings during the 
long summer vacation ? In New York we have established 
vacation schools in the forenoon, and vacation playgrounds 
in the afternoon and evening. The vacation schools give 
instruction in drawing and carpentry, Venetian ironwork, 
chair caning, and other arts for boys, and cooking, sewing, 
dressmaking, fancy work, and nursing for girls. Kinder- 
gartens are conducted for the little ones. Perhaps the 
most enthusiastic classes, however, are the continuation 
classes, intended for children who failed of promotion in 
the day schools in June. 

Vacation playgrounds are established this year in two 
hundred and forty centers. About fifty of them are re- 
served for the tenement mothers and their babies. They 
are frequented by many of the real mothers and by thou- 
sands of the " little mothers." The roof playgrounds are 
thronged every night by children who eagerly climb five 
or six long flights of stairs to escape from the heat and 
the fetid odors of the street, to listen to the music of a 
band, or to dance and sing to their hearts' content in the 
cooler, purer air of the roof. Last summer the average 
attendance in these playgrounds was over 110,000 per day. 

Such are the out-of-school activities conducted by the 
Board of Education at public expense in public school prem- 
ises in Greater New York. What other activities might be 
conducted to utilize these premises to the fullest extent and 
for the benefit of the largest possible number of people ? I 
believe the following would be successful : — 



394 



ECONOMICAL USE OF SCHOOL BUILDINGS 



1. Each high school should be kept open practically all summer for the 
benefit of those students who failed of promotion in June, and of those who 
desire to complete the course in less than the prescribed four years. Cleve- 
land has set us an excellent example by keeping her technical high school 
open the year round. 

2. Every school playground and gymnasium, indoors and out-of-doors, 
should be kept open every afternoon throughout the year under the direc- 
tion of skilled attendants. 

3. Every workshop and cooking room should be open for instruction each 
school-day afternoon and on Saturday morning. Only in this way can suffi- 
cient eye and hand training be given to all the boys and girls who need it. 
The attempt now advocated in some quarters to separate manual training 
from industrial training will prove a dismal failure. Manual training is the 
legitimate introduction to learning a trade. It is only through manual train- 
ing that we are able to discover those who have aptitudes for mechanical 
pursuits. 

In conclusion, there are two conditions which, I believe, 
experience has demonstrated are essential to the success 
of any activities undertaken in school premises outside of 
school hours : — 

1. The activities should be under the direction of the 
school authorities and should be supported at public ex- 
pense. No other agency has the means to conduct them 
on a sufficiently large scale. No other agency has the 
staying power to conduct necessary experiments over a 
series of years in order to determine a policy. No other 
agency has the power to secure the essential cooperation 
of the day school staff with those responsible for the out- 
side work. No other agency is so likely to keep the play- 
grounds clear of their most insidious foe — political influence 
in the appointment of the directors. 

2. It is not buildings or equipment that make a play- 
ground successful, but the persons in charge. If the di- 
rector and his assistants do not sympathize with children, 
if they are not resourceful and inventive, if they cannot 



NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATION, 1910 395 

play all children's games and guide children in gymnastics 
and athletics, if they have not the executive ability to vary 
the activities, so that physical exertion, repose, and recrea- 
tive work have their proper time and rotation, the play- 
ground, no matter what its appointments or resources, will 
be a comparative failure. City children must be taught 
how to play. 

As a corollary to the second condition it follows that all 
normal schools and training schools for teachers should 
instruct our future teachers in the teaching of gymnastics, 
athletics, and games. 



XXXIV 

THE PERSONAL POWER OF THE TEACHER 
IN PUBLIC SCHOOL WORK 

(An address delivered before the National Educational Association in Cleve- 
land, Ohio, igo8) 

ONE day not long ago in the very heart of the tene- 
ment-house region, in what is known as the Lower 
East Side of New York, a young woman, who had just left 
the large school of .which she is principal, was slowly pick- 
ing her way through the crowded street. Her progress 
was slow, for the sidewalks were crowded with people, and 
the street, except a small driveway in the center, was filled 
with the pushcarts of peddlers. To an observer it would 
have been at once apparent that the young woman was a 
person of great consequence in that Yiddish-speaking 
crowd, for the children's faces were glad when they saw 
her, and the large boys touched their caps, and not a few 
of the long-bearded men standing beside the pushcarts 
greeted her with, " Good afternoon, Miss K." Presently 
a woman of rather better appearance than the rest, stepped 
alongside of Miss K. and began to walk with her. With 
the unmistakable Yiddish accent she exclaimed, laying a 
respectful hand on Miss K.'s arm : — 

I cannot help seeing how these children, they love you. You know my 
Bennie and Rosie ? They're in your school. You are such a help to me at 

396 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1908 397 

home. Sometime Bennie, he say he won't. Then he quick stop and he 
say: "All right, mamma. Miss K. says it is right that I should obey." Do 
you know, lady, when you stand on that platform in the school and you say 
something, it is just like when God speaks. 

Whether it is because of the repression that existed in 
the foreign lands from which they are gathered, or because 
of the racial sadness that seems to have been their heritage 
since they wept by the waters of Babylon, there is no class 
of people who do so much honor to the teacher, particularly 
if she is one not of their own race, as do the Jews. 

Some twenty-five years ago a man became principal of 
a school in what was then one of the lowest slums of New 
York. It was in the days before tenement-house reform, 
and the abodes from which his pupils came were as a rule 
devoid of those necessities of life — fresh air, light, suffi- 
cient space, and sanitary arrangements. The district was 
crowded with saloons of the lowest class, and along the 
river front were scores of dives frequented by sailors and 
those who profited by their weaknesses. It was also in 
the days before the law required that all teachers should 
be trained and that appointment should be made for merit 
alone. And so the school, like its neighborhood, was in 
sorry condition, with a weak corps of teachers, for had not 
every one of them been a political appointment ? The 
new principal, however, was not only a man of great 
force of character, but he had had a broad college and 
university training. Before the year was out he had routed 
the politicians, and ever afterward not an appointment was 
made in his school except on his recommendation. How 
did he do it ? Not by letters to the newspapers, not by 
denunciation of the politicians, not by lifting up his voice in 



398 PERSONAL POWER OF THE TEACHER 

lamentation over the degeneracy of the times, but by the 
simplest course imaginable — he so won the respect of the 
community that the politicians did not dare to interfere 
with his school, and soon they were all helping him. In- 
stead of asking for the appointment of their sisters and 
their cousins and their aunts as teachers, they began to 
11 acquire merit " by offering medals to the pupils for pro- 
ficiency and by raising money to help along students who, 
the principal said, had the brains to study in higher insti- 
tutions. He was a constant visitor in the wretched homes 
of his pupils. He was a familiar figure in every street and 
alley. Careless, negligent parents he threatened or cajoled. 
He found the means to clothe the child who was naked 
and feed the child who was hungry. He found employ- 
ment after school hours for those who could continue in 
school in no other way. He discovered that so-called 
athletic clubs were hiring the larger boys in his school to 
pummel each other into insensibility in the presence of 
hundreds of brutalized men ; but it took only one visit 
from him to each club to break it up. When with 
figure drawn up to its full height, tense muscles, and the 
stern voice of command, he invoked the terrors of the law 
if any pupil of his was ever entered again in a boxing bout, 
there was not a ruffian in the gang who was not cowed. 
He saw that there were children to whom books did not 
appeal, and for them he devised hand work. He was, I 
believe, the first man in the United States to introduce 
genuine manual training into an elementary school. His 
school became, as every public school ought to be, not 
merely a place of learning, but a social center from which 
uplifting influences constantly radiated. To-day in the 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1908 399 

humble lives of the laborer and the artisan, in the walks 
of business and politics, in the ranks of the lawyers, the 
doctors, the teachers, and the clergymen, there are thou- 
sands who attribute their success in life to the school- 
master, Henry O'Neil. 

I have cited these two cases in order to bring before 
your minds the peculiar conditions under which teaching 
in New York City must be conducted. 

The first of these conditions is our vast foreign popula- 
tion. There are more Jews in New York than in Palestine, 
more Italians than in Rome, and enough foreigners of other 
nationalities to make a city as big as St. Louis. Of the 
75,000 new pupils who enter the New York schools every 
year, probably two thirds cannot speak a word of English. 
In one school I counted children of twenty-nine different 
nationalities who spoke twenty-nine different languages or 
dialects. To the other difficulties of school work, must, 
therefore, be added this, that to the majority of pupils 
the English language must be taught as a foreign lan- 
guage. 

The second condition peculiar to New York is the 
extreme congestion of population in parts of Manhattan 
Island and Brooklyn. In certain large sections the popu- 
lation is the densest in the world, rising as high as 1000 
persons to the acre. They live, on account of extremely 
high rents, in enormous tenement houses ; as many as 
forty families — and the families are always large — under 
one roof. A low plane of living, proneness to disease, 
particularly tuberculosis, and the absence of domestic 
privacy, are the necessary consequences. From these 
tenements the children, often insufficiently or improperly 



400 PERSONAL POWER OF THE TEACHER 

fed, weary through lack of sleep, with their nerves on 
edge, come to the public schools. 

The third condition, peculiar to New York, is the con- 
stant shifting of population. In the tenement districts, 
because of the continuous migration of families, a child sel- 
dom spends all of its school years in one school, generally 
not more than one or two years. 

Of course, out of 15,000 classes there are thousands in 
which the ordinary conditions of school life are to be found ; 
but in other centers, the vast foreign population, the con- 
gestion of population, and the shifting of population, create 
conditions of difficulty for the teacher such as are not to be 
found in the same degree in any other quarter of the globe. 

In other words, the New York City teachers are con- 
fronted with the difficulty not only of teaching an enormous 
mass of children — there are 600,000 pupils in the city 
schools — but of converting, under the most difficult condi- 
tions possible, a great horde of foreigners chiefly from the 
shores of the Mediterranean Sea, alien in language, alien 
in thought, alien in habits, into loyal American citizens. 
To supplement the work of the day schools the Board of 
Education has established several other agencies — evening 
schools, evening recreation centers, vacation schools and 
playgrounds, lectures to working men and women, and or- 
ganized athletic sports — all of which are doing their part 
vigorously and well ; but it is on the regular day schools — 
elementary and high — our two city colleges and our train- 
ing schools for teachers that the chief reliance must be 
placed. 

The first difficulty with which we are confronted is that 
of teaching each year tens of thousands of foreign-born 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1908 401 

children the English language. For such children we have 
organized hundreds of special classes, in which English is 
taught by the Gouin method of teaching a foreign language. 
I often marvel at the quickness with which, in these special 
classes, our teachers manage to teach our little immigrants 
to speak and read and write English. In six months after 
landing on our docks it is no uncommon thing to find 
little Russians or Italians able to do all the work of the 
school, declaiming with tremendous fervor Patrick Henry's 
apostrophe to liberty or telling in their compositions about 
the day when their forefathers landed on Plymouth Rock. 
Some teachers, however, have a more wonderful gift than 
others in teaching foreign children English. One such 
teacher I have in mind. In her class children coming from 
homes of the most squalid surroundings, without a vestige of 
loveliness, surprise us with the beauty of their thought and 
expression. One day the principal, the Miss K. of whom I 
have already spoken, entered this teacher's class — a fifth- 
year class — and asked the children to write down any 
thoughts suggested by anything they had learned that day. 
Here is what one of them, a Russian girl, wrote : " The sky 
is like the ocean because on a bright summer's day the 
clouds in it are like white ships. It is like the land, also, 
for the clouds sometimes seem like splendid castles." Such 
a teacher is not merely skillful in the ordinary sense of the 
term. Those children who come under the spell of her 
enthusiasm carry away some touch of poetic radiance on 
their souls. 

. An even greater difficulty is presented by life in the tene- 
ments. Sometimes this life is one of extreme poverty ; 
but extreme poverty, except during a period of trade sus- 



402 PERSONAL POWER OF THE TEACHER 

pension when men are thrown out of employment in large 
numbers, is the exception rather than the rule. Where 
extreme poverty does exist, I need scarcely tell you that 
the teachers, out of their own slender earnings, are the 
first to come to the rescue. 

Even when the income of the family is considerable, it 
is too often ignorantly and unwisely used or inordinately 
hoarded. The mother generally works as well as the father, 
and too often the children before and after school hours 
are left to shift for themselves. They come to school 
wrongly rather than insufficiently fed, though insufficient 
feeding is no uncommon thing at all times and especially 
in such a year as this when employment has been hard to 
find and the children of the poor have been crying bitterly. 
The principals and teachers have been untiring in providing 
relief for cases of extreme and sometimes, I am afraid, of 
pretended distress. But the evil is too great for individual 
effort to cope with. Malnutrition among the children 
of our large cities — the prolific cause of disease — a chief 
reason for lack of progress in school — the fruitful source 
of intemperance and crime in after years — cries aloud in 
the name of humanity for relief. The plain fact is that the 
child who is improperly fed or insufficiently fed cannot do 
\ts school work and cannot control its instinctive impulses. 
To relieve this great suffering, to cure this great evil, it is 
not necessary that boards of education should provide food 
without price ; it is necessary only that they should provide 
wholesome, well-cooked food at cost price. 

While we are waiting for this — perhaps the most press- 
ing of all school reforms — the teachers are doing what they 
can to remedy the disease wrought by the tenement house 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1908 403 

life — a life of crowded quarters, of bad air, bad light, and 
insufficient sleep. Our medical inspection, being provided 
by the Department of Health and in no degree under the 
control of the Board of Education, is quite inadequate. 
The principals and teachers are untiring in their efforts to 
induce parents to have remediable defects discovered by 
the examining physicians corrected; such as myopia and 
that most prevalent cause of disorder and so-called incor- 
rigibility — adenoid growths in the throat. Only in about 
25 per cent of the cases, however, do the parents pay any 
attention to the request of the teachers. Some two years 
ago we had a remarkable experience which will illustrate 
the difficulties of this work among a crowded, ignorant, 
prejudiced, and highly excitable people. In a school in the 
Lower East Side there were collected a large number of over- 
age and mentally defective children. A medical examina- 
tion showed that one hundred and fifty of them were suffer- 
ing from adenoid growths in the throat. In the case of 
seventy, the parents had the necessary operation performed. 
In the case of eighty, the parents either refused or neglected. 
The principal obtained the consent of these parents to 
have the operations performed in school. She secured the 
services of one of the most famous throat specialists in the 
country. The operations were successfully performed. Al- 
most instantly a rumor flew like lightning through the neigh- 
borhood that the children's throats were being cut. Frenzied 
mothers and fathers by the thousand besieged the school. 
For several days if a Health Board physician appeared in 
the neighborhood of a public school in the ghetto it was 
the signal for a mob to storm the gates of the schoolhouse. 
Thorough discipline withstood these attacks, just as it has 



404 PERSONA]. POWER OF THE TEACHER 

preserved the children's lives in many a serious alarm of 
fire. The steadiness, good temper, and tact of principals 
and teachers bore down and calmed the frenzy of the mob — 
another manifestation of the personality required of the 
teacher in the New York City schools. 

Our courses in sewing and domestic science are doing 
much not only for individual pupils, but to introduce order, 
economy, and an American plane of living into the home. 
The good offices of the teachers in this respect are not 
confined, however, to the teachers of sewing and cooking, 
as the following story will show. 

Mr. Y. had among his pupils a boy about thirteen years 
of age who was quite irregular in attendance, though a 
fairly good student. As the boy gave no satisfactory ex- 
planation of his irregularity, the teacher called on the boy's 
parents and found that they were living in two or three 
rooms of a miserable tenement. The father, a tailor by 
trade, was out of work, the mother was sick in bed, and 
there were four children, of whom two were cripples. 
The rent had not been paid, and the family were on the 
point of being evicted from the wretched lodgings. The 
father, who was too proud to appeal to charity, had 
trudged about the city for many days in search of work, 
but always in vain. He kept the boy, who was the oldest 
of the family, home to look after the other children and 
the invalid mother ; besides, the boy had no proper cloth- 
ing to wear, especially in inclement weather. To make a 
long story short, the teacher was shocked at what he saw 
and heard, paid the rent that was due, obtained a position 
for the father, and provided the boy with suitable clothing. 

The boy attended school regularly thereafter, graduated 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1908 405 

in one course, and obtained a position through the teacher. 
The family moved out of the neighborhood, and the teacher 
lost all track of them. 

About eleven years later, Mr. Y., who had since taken a 
higher position, was sitting in his office one day when a 
well-dressed and prosperous-looking gentleman walked in 

and said : " Mr. Y., you do not know me ? I am , 

the tailor, whom you helped in a critical period of his life. 
I have been trying for a long time to locate you in order to 
express my gratitude and to repay you, so far as I can, 
what I owe you." He produced a large roll of bills — 
some $400 or $500 — which he had drawn from the bank, 
to present ocular proof that he was prosperous. He re- 
paid every cent of the money advanced to him, and stated 
that he had a little home in another borough and that his 
family were in good health and circumstances. By dint of 
steady work and some careful investments he had accumu- 
lated what to him was quite a fortune. His boy was in 
business for himself and had recently married. 

Mr. Y., who had long ago forgotten the episode, then 
realized that he had builded better than he knew, and that 
the teacher's influence may extend far beyond the walls of 
a classroom and work for good in the larger sphere of life 
beyond. 

Another story even better illustrates the influence the 
tactful teacher may have in the tenement home. One day 
a girl, ragged, dirty, disheveled, was brought into a class 
taught by a bright young teacher who had already become 
noted for her success with foreign children. Leah, for that 
was the girl's name, could speak no English. She at once 
manifested, however, a strong liking for her teacher and, 



4 o6 PERSONAL POWER OF THE TEACHER 

drawn by this affection, mastered the intricacies of English 
speech in an incredibly short time. As soon as she could 
make herself understood, she would lie in wait for her 
teacher and walk with her part of the way home. Slowly 
at first, more rapidly afterward, Teacher began to drop 
hints as to how Leah's personal appearance might be im- 
proved. Every hint was acted on, and soon Leah began 
to wash her face and comb her hair, to tie and polish her 
shoes, and to have her clothes clean and neatly mended 
and held in place by hooks and eyes instead of pins. One 
day when they came to the door of the tenement where 
Leah lived, Teacher expressed a desire to make a call on 
Leah's mother. The sight that met her eyes was not a 
pleasant one. The family contained many children of 
whom Leah was the eldest, and there were two boarders be- 
sides, all domiciled in two rooms. Out of a confused mass 
of bedding, children, rickety furniture, and broken cooking 
utensils, rose the inevitable sewing machines out of which 
the family earned a living and was doubtless saving money. 
In subsequent afternoon walks, Teacher began to throw 
out suggestions as to how Leah might reform the home. 
Leah immediately set to work. The mother regarded 
Leah's doings askance, but nothing could withstand her 
enthusiasm, and she soon won her father's strong support. 
The boarders were turned out. Another room was hired. 
The rooms were cleansed and put in order. Even the 
small brothers and sisters were subjected, at first greatly to 
their disgust, to the scrubbing' brush, and were obliged to 
learn how to comb their hair. About this time Teacher 
loaned Leah an illustrated magazine. It contained a pic- 
ture of a dinner table set with silver and cut glass and gar- 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1908 407 

nished with flowers. By this time Leah had learned to 
cook in the cooking class. With the picture as her guide, 
a new and bolder scheme than any yet imagined, en- 
tered her little brain. There must be a dinner table with 
a white cloth and garnished as nearly as possible like the 
picture. When this triumph was complete, Leah wrote a 
note which her father signed inviting Teacher to dinner. 
Teacher accepted the invitation. What a change met her 
eyes ! Instead of the squalor of her former visit, she be- 
held the neatness of a poor but well-ordered home. The 
father and mother were a bit stiff in their reception, because 
they had but a few words of English, but they treated 
Teacher with all the reverence due to a queen. And she 
was a queen, for was she not to those poor Russian Jews 
the incarnation of American civilization ? 

Thousands of teachers, God bless them ! are doing work 
of this kind in New York City. Perhaps those are doing 
it best who fill the school with the best spirit of our age — 
the spirit of social cooperation. One of my district 
superintendents furnishes me with an account of a class in 
which this spirit is abundantly illustrated : — 

Opening the door of the classroom I heard the busy hum of industry. 
Near the desk sat Miss X., surrounded by a group to whom she was explaining 
some faults of composition they had made in common. These I learned later 
were the backward pupils who most needed the teacher's individual help. 
The rest of the class were working in groups of two each — a bright and a 
moderate pupil. It was a most animated exercise. Every two pupils were 
reading and correcting a composition written by one of them. Each in turn 
had the double benefit of his own criticism and that of his associate. When 
the teacher became disengaged, a pair of eagerlv throbbing hands called for 
judgment on some disputed point, and this would at times involve a second 
discussion between teacher and pupils. The aim and its success in operation 
were equally obvious. The pupils were in the modern spirit of social cooper- 



4 o8 PERSONAL POWER OF THE TEACHER 

ation. striving to find the truth. There was no copying, no suggestion of im- 
pertinent monitorial supervision. In aiding, each was learning. 

When there is such a manifestation of personality in the 
teacher, the school is not merely a preparation for life. It 
is life. 

And what a power a principal may be who sets teachers 
an example in filling the school with the spirit of social 
cooperation ! A gifted principal writes me : — 

I began my teaching career in a school entirely devoid of ideals for anything 
beyond the hard facts of the textbook. The contrast between this and a 
school where the child was looked upon as God's choicest gift, revealed to me 
not alone the dignity of the teacher's calling, but its tremendous responsibility. 

The tenement home, it is scarcely necessary to say, breeds 
many bad boys. Nowhere is the teacher's personality 
more clearly revealed than in dealing with such boys. I 
asked the principal of a large school attended almost ex- 
clusively by Italians — a race prolific in unruly boys, at 
least in America — to write me the characteristics of the 
teachers who were most successful in dealing with such 
cases, and he writes this : — 

There are at least two characteristics of these teachers. These, if I read 
them rightly, are a rare degree of sympathy with children and an equally rare 
sense of justice. Not the sympathy which makes the -man reason like the 
child, but the sympathy by which he is able to see with the child's eyes, and at 
the same time with his own clearer vision. Not the justice which treats all 
alike, but the higher justice which makes a difference. 

How quickly sympathy will act was recently told me by 
one of my associates : An incorrigible boy on his return 
from the truant school to his class struck a classmate in 
the eye, and fled from the building. At the close of school 
the principal went to the home of the boy. On approach- 
ing the house, the boy fled to a proper distance, but on the 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 190S 409 

assurance of the principal that he did not propose to arrest 
him, or punish him, or allow any one else to do so, the boy 
led the way to his mother. The mother was exceedingly 
angry at the boy and urged the principal to give him a 
sound thrashing, saying that she herself would punish him 
as soon as the principal left. The principal told her that 
he should do nothing of the kind, that he would not allow 
him to be sent to the truant school again, and that if she 
undertook to punish him he would make trouble for her. 
He assured the mother that he wished the boy to return to 
school and promised to do everything that he could to help 
the boy to be a man. The principal assured the boy 
that if he would come to school the next day he would re- 
ceive a very cordial welcome ; that he would help him in 
every way to keep up with his class work. After a further 
conference in this line, the boy agreed to return to school 
the next day. The attitude of the principal, his assurance 
that he would help him to be a man, proved the making of 
the boy. 

Repression and fear are rapidly being eliminated as fac- 
tors of control in the New York schools. The favorite and 
perhaps the most successful plan of managing a bad boy is 
when a teacher with sympathetic insight discovers some 
natural aptitude or liking, finds occupation of that nature 
and builds upon the foundation thus laid. I have collected 
many examples of boys made over through some fitting 
employment or the acceptance of some responsibility which 
they enjoyed. Myra Kelly's "monitor of the goldfish" is the 
type. A few days ago an unmistakable son of Italy entered 
my office. He held a parcel done up in paper in one 
hand ; with the other he handed me a note. The note, 



410 PERSONAL POWER OF THE TEACHER 

which was from his principal, told me that the boy had 
been the worst she had ever met in a long experience — 
disobedient, violent, and apparently incapable of learning. 
This term, however, he came under the care of a teacher 
who discovered that Giovanni had a passion for making 
things. She set him to making baskets. He was no longer 
troublesome and was learning rapidly. The paper parcel 
contained a beautiful piece of basketry in vase form which 
showed the touch of the natural artist. 

We are only beginning, I believe, to realize the influence 
athletics may have in reclaiming unruly boys. The great 
prominence given to athletics during the past few years in the 
New York schools has afforded an opportunity to test this 
means of school discipline. I have no hesitation in saying 
that athletics rightly used not only improves the carriage, 
increases physical power, and develops moral energy, but 
is a vital force in reducing otherwise unmanageable boys 
to terms. This example will suffice : — ■ 

J. H., a boy of fourteen, was known in school parlance 
as a " terror." He had passed from one teacher to another, 
not by way of promotion, but mainly with the hope of 
finding the teacher who could pick out and develop his 
latent ability. In the course of events he came under the 
guidance of Miss Blank — his last chance. He entered 
just before recess of the day I visited Miss Blank. At re- 
cess the boys were busy with athletics. J. H. stood by 
with the sneering face he usually presented for things 
meaning effort. Regardless of this, he was placed in the 
group of smaller boys for the broad jump. Possibly to 
show his superiority, he jumped in turn and clearly out- 
classed every boy in his group. The teacher encouraged 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1908 411 

this and carefully watched him, and every time his work 
outclassed his group he was placed in the next. He was 
promoted thus, until one day he led the group of largest 
boys. J. H. was very quiet for the rest of the day. In 
the afternoon he actually tried some of the regular class 
work. It had been a new experience for him to lead in any- 
thing requiring effort. He had neglected his opportunities 
so long that the possibility of surpassing any one else had 
never entered his mind. Through this interest the teacher 
aroused interest in his studies and helped him after school 
every day. In the spring, a basket-ball team was started 
at his school and J. H. was elected captain by the team as 
an expression of their admiration of his athletics. 

Only once did J. H. backslide. Then his teacher firmly 
took from him his honors as captain and leader in athletics 
for one month. He went through the usual " I don't 
care" of other days, but he did care, and before the term 
of punishment was up, he was begging his teacher to 
shorten his banishment by extra good behavior. J. H. was 
promoted that term. He is now a useful member of society 
and in business — another living example of a teacher's 
unselfish work. 

But boys are not the only offenders in school. It is, 
alas ! not uncommon to meet with depravity in girls. A 
principal tells me this story of one of her teachers : Over 
two years ago there was in this teacher's class a young 
girl whose life was one of degradation. Her family and 
home were low in every respect. A visit to the family 
convinced this young teacher that nothing could be gained 
there. A series of dreadful incidents occurred, foreshad- 
( owing murder and suicide. The young teacher, at great 



412 PERSONAL POWER OF THE TEACHER 

risk to herself, but through this wonderful power she pos- 
sesses, averted both, though the girl was expelled from 

the school. Not yet discouraged, Miss went to those 

in authority and had the girl readmitted. Then the teacher 
induced the girl to leave her home, and found employ- 
ment for her with friends. She has won their respect, for 
they report her a very quiet, refined young woman. 
Though she has left her family, she still contributes to 
their support, and is now engaged to be married to a very 
estimable young man. 

This young teacher still keeps in touch with the girl. 
Her personal power is far-reaching and forcible. Her 
personality is very attractive, but a strong will that domi- 
nates her every act is the striking characteristic of this 
personal power. 

Here is a story, in her own words, which a girl, regener- 
ated through the influence of a noble teacher, has written 
to one of my principals : — 

At the time I came under the influence of this teacher, I was an unhappy, 
self-willed girl, who blundered continually. I knew my faults, but I had neither 
the ability nor desire to correct them. Sometimes I tried to force myself to 
do right, but it seemed like trying to climb a soft, steep gravelly bank. I kept 
sinking and slipping back at every effort to go forward. 

I recognized in this teacher a woman who was at once strong and gentle, 
firm and kind, noble and human, strict and sympathetic, wise and simple, 
powerful and controlled. Above all, she was a person of high moral standards. 

As I became used to her type of excellence, I felt its beauty more and 
more, and she began to have a wonderful influence over me, which never lost 
its effect. She did not realize her power; she was simply living in her usual 
way. But I knew I had found a friend who would help me out of the misery 
and danger of despair. 

My blunders brought me before her, as an almost unimpressionable case. 
She had given me help; I knew what to do, but I seemed powerless. I 
could not make myself do right. She bore with me patiently, but one day 
she called me to her room and talked with me. I do not remember three 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1908 413 

sentences of it now. All that I was conscious of was that I was receiving an 
electric treatment of personality — a noble, magnificent character was revealing 
itself to me. I was speechless with wonder and awakening. 

She had trusted me and I had done wrong and deserved severe treatment. 
But she chicled me without temper, rashness, or personal remarks. She was 
beyond the reach of my wrong doing, but still she was honestly grieved by 
my foolish ways and disappointed at my weakness. 

Incorrigible as I had been, I was reached, for there was something in her 
gentle, firm tone and steady, searching look that offered hope and courage ; 
something in that magnetic, sympathetic personality that urged me to brace 
up, go forward, and conquer the past mistakes, and live according to higher 
standards. That woman ennobled my life. 

" I still," adds the principal, " have this young woman 
under observation, and I know that the effect of this 
teacher on her life is permanent." 

Marshall, in his monumental work on " Political Econ- 
omy," tells us that probably one half of the talent and genius 
born into this world finds its manifestations in the lower 
ranks of society. If so, what a responsibility rests on the 
public school teacher to discover and encourage talent ! I 
remember how an old lady who was principal of a school 
in a poor neighborhood in Brooklyn often told me how she 
discovered budding dramatic talent in a little madcap of a 
girl who afterwards became the bright particular star of 
the American stage, as Ada Rehan. But why dwell on 
the shining examples ? Let me rather relate, in the words 
of one of my district superintendents, the work of a man 
who was singularly successful in inducing boys to go on to 
the high school after completing the work of the elemen- 
tary school. 

This teacher, Mr. X., had a graduating class in a crowded 
section of the city. Without exception his pupils were 
poor, but as a class, responsive and appreciative. 

His assumption, as graduating class teacher, was that no 



414 PERSONAL POWER OF THE TEACHER 

elementary school instruction was sufficient to fit a boy for 
modern life, however able or successful had been the men 
who lacked even so much. His problem was so to appeal 
to the understanding and emotion of his pupils that they 
would feel as he did and make that feeling a motive to 
activity in their lives. Some he influenced immediately ; 
the restless ones who wished- to " go to work " he won over 
before the term had closed. His power lay less in the 
definite reasoning and appeal he made than in the confi- 
dence he had inspired. There lay his strength and power. 

But however he might influence their desires for better 
education, there was a more formidable obstacle. These 
children were poor, and poverty shrinks neither before 
argument nor appeal. With many of them that last year 
at school had been a painful story of sacrifice at home. 
Some of the boys knew from a more fearsome dictionary 
than books, the meaning of cold and hunger and neglected 
illness. He had kept them well together with that goal of 
childish triumph before them — the graduation day and 
the school certificate — but for the subsequent schooling he 
had no such incentive. 

If poverty cannot be talked down, it may be challenged 
and fought. He proposed schemes of industry to tide them 
over : the evening paper stand, the afternoon delivery for 
the corner store, the early morning route, these and other 
devices were tried and employed. 

Then the parents, too, were sent for and questioned. 
Even among those who seemed the poorest, it is often 
thrift, even at times avarice, that takes the child away 
from opportunity. To the skeptical Mr. X. explained the 
value in material dividends that a year or two more of 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1908 415 

instruction might give. To the imaginative and emotional 
he painted the loving tribute of gratitude that would bless 
their old age, for one more sacrifice of effort and denial. 
He was not less fertile in appeal, if appeal might win, than 
in practical suggestion. 

The result was that the great majority of his pupils bound 
themselves to begin a course of secondary instruction. 
He tells me that at graduation one boy was working from 
four o'clock in the morning till school time ; one labored at 
night in a cracker bakery ; another delivered parcels both 
before and after school, and several had their round of 
customers for newspapers. In such humble ground he 
planted seed that might some day yield the laurel. 

Circumstances subsequently necessitated his transfer to 
another part of the city, and he lost sight of his charges. 
Recently, however, he met two of them, and shortly after 
others called upon him. Without exception they had 
done well. One is an instructor in a school of technology, 
three are teachers, three others are completing a course in 
law school, and two have already begun practice. They 
have kept the old class spirit together and, as the teacher 
informs me, recently met to arrange a reunion with a single 
honored guest — himself. 

This man would not tolerate the arguments of those who 
claim that the majority of boys will be just as " successful " 
without as with a high school education. To all such he 
made answer : " My work here is to do what I can to put 
these boys in the way of getting all that the skill and wis- 
dom of the schools can yield in preparing them for the best 
of life. I wish to see them whole men." 

There is no more useful manifestation of personal power 



416 PERSONAL POWER OF THE TEACHER 

than that of the man or woman who stimulates to the 
higher culture and who guides the student in the direction 
indicated by his natural aptitude. 

Perhaps you think I have given too little attention to the 
purely scholastic side of our work. If so, let me sketch 
for you two teachers whose personal power is manifested 
in opposite ways. One is Miss C, a high school teacher 
of history. Who that has seen her can forget her ? Her 
dress, her voice, her speech, her gestures, her black eyes 
— all attractive. She holds her pupils spellbound. Their 
attention never wanders for a second. What she wills 
them to do they do. She questions them as Socrates 
might have done, leading them to see how ignorant they 
were in their first state and then how well informed they 
may be if they will but reason logically. She dismisses 
them with three topics to look up for the next day and 
with suggestions regarding the particular bookshelves on 
which helpful books may be found. The pupils will be 
sure to do plenty of reading and thinking in preparation 
for the next lesson, for they know that Miss C.'s ques- 
tioning will turn them inside out. She does not merely 
question. When she receives a good answer, she adds to 
it, painting in a few brief sentences a picture that will re- 
main in the pupils' minds. 

The second teacher is a teacher of psychology in a nor- 
mal school. His pupils sit in a circle with him. He does 
not say more than a dozen sentences. The pupils seldom 
give him a glance. They conduct the conference them- 
selves as any party of friends might talk together at the 
fireside. The subject is the will. A young woman begins 
to talk as soon as the bell sounds, saying that she will go 



NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION, 1908 417 

on with what she and her friend have found out about the 
subject. At her first pause two or three are ready with 
questions, objections, or comments. Nearly every one has 
something to say, but as this young woman has evidently 
obtained permission from the class to present this particular 
topic, she is regarded as the leader for the time being, and 
is consequently appealed to or challenged by the others. 
The teacher speaks only when it becomes necessary to 
say that such and such a point had been a matter of dis- 
pute for ages. When he speaks it is always with deference 
to the leader, and the pupils give him only as much atten- 
tion as they give to one another. The teacher, when 
asked, cannot tell me what the topic for the next lesson 
will be — his pupils have not informed him. They study 
the whole subject of psychology in this way, using no one 
textbook, but having access to many, selecting their own 
topics, conducting their own oral examinations, rating 
themselves, calling on him only when they are " stumped." 
He shows his remarkable power in keeping himself from 
interfering, though he is really guiding all the time that 
the pupils seem to be acting independently. 

I have tried to sketch many different types of teachers 
who have evidently great personal power. Who shall 
analyze it ? Who shall determine the common elements ? I 
shall not attempt the task. The possessor of personal power 
does not know what it is. He only knows that the virtue 
is in him. We only know that all great leaders of men have 
had it in a marked degree. We see its manifestations in 
the reactions of pupils. Thrice blessed is he who is per- 
mitted to see that these reactions are good and not evil, 
and that they make for " manners, virtue, freedom, power." 



OCT 18 1912 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



019 751 878 9 



